‘Twilight’ director Catherine Hardwicke may direct ‘Romeo and Juliet’AKA NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Oh no...not again...

‘Twilight’ director Catherine Hardwicke may direct ‘Romeo and Juliet’ for ABC | EW.com.

Read the above, then do one of the following:

A) Titter and giggle like a middle school girl at the thought of Leo/Claire 2.

B) React like an adult and vomit profusely for hours.

Why am I so angry?  Let me count the ways. (Not Shakespeare…I know.)

1.  Shakespeare wrote in the neighborhood of 37 plays.  Can we maybe take a look at one of the other 36 plays he wrote before doing yet another misinterpretation of one of Shakespeare’s most middling plays?

2.  Yes, I know Hardwicke directed the critically acclaimed Thirteen, but she also directed Twilight.  I’m allowed to hold a grudge.

3. Romeo and Juliet – any Shakespearean text – in the hands of Disney-trained actors is like putting a loaded weapon in the hands of an angry chimp.  Someone will get hurt and most likely covered in feces when it’s all done.

4. Romeo and Juliet as a TV series?  I could see the story being reworked into a longer narrative, where Romeo and Juliet don’t die only three days after meeting each other and we’re allowed to see the in greater detail the inner workings of the two families … but why would I want to when I can just turn on the CW?

I would love to see more mainstrem Shakespeare – truly and really, I would.  And maybe, if this comes to fruition, it will be a pleasant surprise – a film or series that examines the thin line between love and hate and the power of choice in a world that seems driven by chance or fate.  Or maybe we’ll get more of Leo and Claire staring wistfully at each other through a fish tank.  Better yet – maybe Romeo will be a sparkly vampire and Juliet a werewolf.

Spider-Man Reboot Update: Emma Stone Is…

A blonde playing a redhead playing a blonde - Insanity!

Fiery redhead? …Check

Snarky, witty retorts? … CHECK

Emma Stone a lock to play Mary Jane Watson? … not so fast…

Over the past couple of weeks or so, rumors have been swirling around Emma Stone landing a key role in the upcoming Spider-Man reboot.  And why not?  She’s on fire.  After stealing the shows in Superbad, The Rocker, and Zombieland, Stone received strong notices as the lead in Easy A.  She has a unique look and remarkable comic timing and she’s only 22.  Rumors quickly pointed her in the direction of Mary Jane Watson – Peter Parker’s quick-witted, redheaded soul mate.  Sounds like a match…

Two problems… 1) in my last update I declared there would be no Mary Jane Watson  and 2) word broke last night that Emma Stone will be playing the very blonde Gwen Stacy.  Well, gasp and swoon…how did this come about?

This is a potential PR nightmare for the film.  Many fans are still seething over the hair color controversy of the first trilogy.  Kirsten Dunst (a blonde) playing Mary Jane (a redhead)…Bryce Dallas Howard (a redhead) playing Gwen Stacy ( a blonde).  Sheer madness!  And now the film’s current handlers seem set on continuing these hair color-boundary crossing ways.  Will they never learn?  Now, I don’t want to be accused of hair-ism here, but is it wrong to want blondes to play blondes and redheads to play redheads?  And don’t even get me started on darker-haired women … the world will never ever need to see a blonde Catherine Zeta Jones.  Actors need to stick with the hair color God gave them and only take on parts that are appropriate for that particular hair color.  For this casting choice alone, people need to organize and boycott this film until Sony agrees to cast a natural blonde as Gw…

Wait…what’s that…Oh…

Here’s an interesting factoid that’s just been handed to me – Emma Stone is actually a blonde.  She died her hair red for Superbad, apparently at Judd Apatow’s suggestion, and kept it that way. OK…but still, we KNOW her as a redhead and so our sense of her as an actress derives from her redheaded-ness.  I mean, for a natural blonde to convince the world she’s a redhead is one thing, but for a natural blonde to become famous as a redhead, then go back to playing blondes…well, that’s just unheard of.

How much does hair color make the woman?  Will the change from red to blonde take the zing out of her delivery?  Think I’m ridiculous?  Consider this:  Laura Prepon, late of That 70′s Show, had red hot timing as a redhead.  Laura Prepon as a blonde?  Total dulls-ville.  Kirsten Dunst – a blonde – playing the redheaded Mary Jane in Raimi’s Spider-Man? Not so caliente.

Of course, I’m cherry-picking here, but this amounts to the kind of reaction you can read on-line. In all sincerity, Emma Stone’s a great actress and she will add much life to whatever role she gets.  Heck, they could cast her as J. Jonah Jameson and it would probably work, though I definitely do not need to see her in a salt and pepper crew cut.

****SPOILER ALERT***

The bigger question concerns how long she’ll be sticking around the franchise.  If you don’t know what happens to Gwen Stacy in the comic books and you don’t want to know, please stop reading.  I won’t be offended.  Click the  “More” if you know/don’t care about Gwen’s fate.

Gaga Beefs Up: A Short Invective from Virgil

How to top a meat dress? A dress made of tiny Gagas.

Images of Lady Gaga in her meat dress at the VMA’s are all over the place:  here, here, and here.  Copyright law and a desire to enjoy dinner tonight prevent from re-posting those images here.  So, instead, I offer up this very creative (and Creative Commons!) image from Flickr user qthomasbower, whose work you really should check out (I’ll wait…).

The three “here” links are the top three hits on a Google search for “Lady Gaga Meat Dress”:  an MTV news site (duh, it was their show…),  E Online, and the Huffington Post, which also features an evenly split poll on whether the dress was offensive or “awesome”… (So that’s where it’s at, Huffington Post – “Hot or Not” polls? Really?) .  I’m not sure which bothers me more: 1) That  a grown woman showed up at a public event in meat  2) That people are debating whether or not it was “awesome”  or 3) That it’s being reported as news.