“Has it ever been acknowledged anywhere that GLENN KENNY is an ABSOLUTE, 100% DEAD RINGER for the guy who played the unctuous attorney Maury Levy on THE WIRE? You are IDENTICAL TWINS.”—Lex G, in a more-pointless-than-usual comment, semi-hijacking a thread about Abbey Lincoln, in retaliation (I suppose) for deleting a prior useless comment he posted on that thread, which he only put up again anyway, because this is what he does with his time apparently. Anyhow, you be the judge; at left, actor Michael Kostroff as the Levy character; at right, myself, at band practice (I’ll get to that in another post), a week and a day ago. And if you endorse Mr. G’s judgment on this issue, you’ll likely appreciate what he has to say about Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, too.
It has been asked around these parts why I don’t just ban Lex outright. There are a lot of reasons, which might be tiresome to go into here, but mainly, as I believe most of you understand, it’s a matter of principle. I’ve been lucky—maybe you could say blessed—that this blog has attracted the thoughtful, interesting, engaged, and often feisty readers and commenters that it has. Lex really is the first, I hate to say it, troll. And as he’d be the first to point out to you, he is a troll of distinction, having earned (qualified, I feel compelled to point out) praise from a handful of real writers. But I have to admit he’s beginning to try my patience. Not with the Maury Levy remark (interestingly enough, one of my very first bosses, the 1986 editor of Video Review magazine, was also named Maury Levy), but with the one I initially deleted, in which Lex evinces his enthusiasm for Taylor Swift and whoever. I think Taylor Swift’s okay myself, but it’s clear that Lex wasn’t so much interested in sharing an enthusiasm than in showing some disrespect for the late Abbey Lincoln and the various lovers of her work who wanted to chime in on the thread. Which makes him not just a troll but pretty much a total DICK. A worse DICK than I myself was back in the day when I used to send indignant drunken e‑mails to Jonah Goldberg, of all the assholes to waste one’s time on. So maybe I indulge Lex because I feel kind of sorry for him? I dunno, and I can’t really devote too much time to the question at the moment as I have stuff to do. Anyway. In the meantime. “IDENTICAL TWINS.”
Trollish troll is trolling, you don’t say!
I have a feeling Lex G thinks of himself as the Omar in this situation.
I have to say, Glenn, your physical appearance is rapidly returning to your B&W Première headshot look, the very same pic you recently-ish posted here when asking if film writers could be ruggedly attractive, too. Well done!
As for Lex, if he barged into your house, was rude to everyone and refused to leave, I’m sure your boot would have words with his arse like THAT. I think the same principle applies here, in my opinion. Otherwise, your blog will just end up being one long struggle against some bloke no one is interested in.
I’ve wielded the delete button before, silently, summarily and without apology, usually for either full-out crudeness or attacking another commenter. Nobody’s ever said a word, including those whose comments got deleted. I understand the First-Amendment-freak desire for untrammeled discussion–I’ve also let stuff go–but it’s your house, Glenn. To borrow your memorable phrasing, as long as you’re the guy paying the annual Typepad fee to maintain this blog, delete whatever the @#$! you want.
I think you ought to ban him simply because it’s what he wants. Then he can go around proclaiming himself “Too hot for Glenn Kenny’s blog” and you get rid of a pest. Everybody’s happy.
Besides, he was being obnoxious in an Abbey Lincoln tribute thread? Then fuck him.
I think the real scoop here is that Lex G picked up on one of Glenn’s favorite words, “unctuous.” The sincerest form of flattery and all that. Not that I’d have any problem with banning the tiresome asshole.
Next he’ll be throwing around “putative”!
I wouldn’t mind Lex so much if he was just a horndog, because who am I to throw stones, or argumentative, because who am I to throw stones, or even angry all the time. No, I can’t stand the hypocrisy. I’ve read his “work” on other blogs, and the whole “Nobody loves movies like me” paired with “I won’t watch foreign films or black and white films because I don’t want to bang dead squack” stuff is just unbelievably boring. And even that I would be able to get past if he wasn’t always derailing threads. It’s really that last one that would seem to me to be the deal-breaker.
I have to admit that wading through LexG’s rants is becoming tiresome. Why does he post here? He already posts the exact same thing over at Jeff Wells blog.
actually in that photo you’re closer to brother mouzone than maurice levy
It’s about time.
We could also mention how he regularly trashes the posters on this very blog over on Jeff Wells’ site (“those guys couldn’t even make pussy sound exciting”), which in my opinion is grounds for giving him the boot.
My take:
From the pictures posted, yeah, I can see a slight resemblance between you and Michael K. Hardly TWINS. (Lex bustin’ your chops)
Also, as a middle aged guy who has struggled with keeping in shape, over the years, I can appreciate the effort it takes to stay fit. I must say, you’re looking pretty good. Lean. Mean. Music Machine. Congrats.
As for Lex, the guy seems to struggle with insecurity and some other stuff. Currently wrestling with sobriety, which makes me ‘pull for him’. Probably deep down inside, a decent person who needs to grow up a bit.
Regardless, as others have pointed out, SCR is your place Glenn and you should do what you have to do to keep it cool.
I really dislike the term troll…I think it’s racist and reductionist but this Lexus guy uses to many bad curse words.…like vag. Off with his beard!
You have to give LexG credit where it is due for never mixing up his log-ins and posting as Armond.
No disrespect, Glenn, but I’m feeling a balder, punker Dee Snyder (sans makeup, of course) vibe in that picture of you.
Yeah, actually, I’m getting a kinda Fear, kinda X, ’80s hardcore L.A. vibe from that band picture myself. Can’t wait to hear the real details.
As for the aforementioned commenter – well. As I’ve said, before, I think the longterm approach for particularly annoying posters is, if all they’re doing is looking for attention, to just deny them that, and eventually they’ll go away.
Short-term? Well, I have to say this SCR sandbox, which a variety of commenters get to play in, gets turned very quickly into a litterbox when some nasty alley cat comes in and fouls things up on a regular basis.
I appreciate your position – and, of course, it’s your place, Glenn, as the Siren points out. But it’s a little like running a bar and having one nasty character occupying a stool, talking trash and driving away the regulars, night after night. At what point is enough, you know, Enough?
Of course I’ll keep reading, whatever you decide. Who wouldn’t? But posts like the ones you mention do definitely dilute the pleasure of lingering over the comments thread. It had been a pleasure previously, frankly, to hang out on a site where this particular person was NOT a constant tumescent presence…
I’m curious: what makes the term “troll” racist?
I agree with Stephen Whitty up to a point. However, the minute someone posts something on a blog, they’re getting attention. Especially this guy, who seems to think about nothing BUT getting attention. From what I can tell, it’s working: now he has everybody here talking about him.
Glenn, my friend, it’s commendable that you’re owning up to your own past bad behavior. But I doubt that you were ever guilty of boring everybody to death the way this guy does.
I can understand your reasons for not banning LexG, but I’m sure I’m not the only one who came over here from Hollywood Elsewhere to get away from him. I say dump him.
@ Kent: I have no idea in what context “troll” is racist, but can report that it used and not always affectionately as a slur against Lower-Peninsula Michiganders by our Upper-Peninsula brethren. (The idea being, since we’re south of the bridge connecting the two, we’re “under” the bridge.)
Of course, the jokes we tell about Da Yoopers are a bit more mean-spirited than that, so I can’t say we’re not getting off easy.
It’d be nice to go to ONE movie blog where LexG isn’t around. Ban the motherfucker already, GK.
I’m an unapologetic LexG fan. Sometimes, when I’m bored, I google his defense of Tom Cruise on the hot blog and, even though it could obviously use a judicious edit, God help me I can’t help but smile.
You may have to scroll down the page: http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/archives/2008/04/about_the_nazi.html
To Jonah Goldberg?!?!? In my best Jack-Nance-in-Eraserhead voice, “Gosh, you really *were* drunk!” LexG probably has an offline life of some kind, but Goldberg’s a troll every minute of the day.
Lex is a depressive alcoholic sex addict, all by his own admission. Indulging his rants is enabling his various illnesses.
I was joking about the racist thing but culture sure is in the toilet. Even fucking trolls know who Taylor Swift is and think Tom Cruise and Ellen Page are erotic. It’s time for Los Angeles and all the wannabees at the shortstop to fall into the ocean. You can pretty much be sure anybody who thinks the use of the word vag is bold is a complete and utter dipshit. what started off as an interesting phenomenon or a reaction to the depersonalization and triviality of the internet has devolved in to more pop culture horse dung.
Thanks for the clarification…Urethra.
Is culture in the toilet because some guy craves attention? He’s a bore, but not because he uses words like “vag,” sad as that is. I think it’s because everything he says is either about himself or about ranking of someone or something: he’s awesome, she sucks, this movie rules, that one blows, people who like this are retards, people who don’t like that are lame, and so on, and on, and on. He might be a character somebody invented or he might be a real sad sack, but either way he’s a conversation-stopper and a bore.
The internet sure does lend itself to compulsive judgment and resentment.
No no, Kent, you’re missing an important fact: HE’S A GREAT WRITER.
JeffMcM: Doesn’t one need to actually have sex to be a sex addict?
THE REINCARNATION OF LEXG by Lex Sarrazin.
A Drama In Three Acts.
Prologue: “Then he can go around proclaiming himself “Too hot for Glenn Kenny’s blog…”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Yeah, that’ll sure knock ’em dead in Kansas. How many people IN THE WORLD know or care about this blog, or even who Glenn Kenny is? Thirty, 40? No offense, of course– though since the ever-classy esteemed former film critic of Première has raised the discourse by calling me a “DICK” and made it eminently clear that I’m not WORTHY of a voice on his 10-man blog, I don’t really give a shit. Sorry I’m not good enough to mix it up with a guy who looks like the alimony attorney from FLETCH, whose heyday was in 1996, and who has the fucking brazenly arrogant AUDACITY to put a FUCKING TIP JAR on his blog looking for handouts. Trust me, Maury, I don’t think your readership is in the money like the Gold Diggers of ’33.
Here’s a suggestion, Glenn: Be a little LESS CONDESCENDING. You’re a SNOB, straight-up. I apparently showed disrespect in some thread honoring someone newly passed away… I’ll concede that’s a dick move, but truth? I didn’t even read it, and for all I know it was a thread about which brand of Trident works the best. So for that reason if none other, I’m in the wrong, and yeah, I wouldn’t want some hater blowing up my blog on the daily either.
But, like, EXCUUUUUUSE ME for bringing my one-man SRO act to this dry-as-burnt toast blog… Guess it IS pretty tough to live up to the submissions of the permanently witless, hostile, blunt and HUMORLESS likes of Jeff McMahon, Lazarus, and Dan Coyle. Hey, they may NEVER say anything interesting EVER, but they can suck the host’s dick but good. That being ALL IMPORTANT, because, you know, Glenn Kenny is such an INTERNATIONALLY RENOWNED FIGURE that the entire world should watch and weep that he doesn’t have a job. Ooh, the Plight of the Endangered Film Critic. Quel Tragedy. You had a what, 12, 15-year run roaming NYC and LA at premieres, hobnobbing with directors, and palling around on sets, SEEING MOVIES FOR A LIVING. But then the bottom fell out and now you have to– GASP– WORK for a living. Hey, Oscar Gamble was an MLB superstar who could hit like a motherfucker in 1972, but I don’t see him putting up an INTERNET TIP JAR to get him a gig back on the Yankees.
MOVIE CRITIC isn’t some INALIABLE RIGHT, and that goes for you and every other FREELANCE CRITIC who’s been whining around here lately… Hey, I have a close family member who was an award-winning journalist, got old, got usurped, lost his tenured job; You know what they did? They swallowed their pride, realized that the past was the past, and GOT A REGULAR JOB like a normal fucking person does. But that’s not GOOD ENOUGH for any of you guys, BECAUSE YOU’RE SO SPECIAL. You’ve HUNG OUT WITH SODERBERGH. You’re BETTER than the common man (fuck all those liberal politics, face it, you guys all LOOK DOWN on the regular schmo, couldn’t GIVE A FUCK about anyone but yourself; At least I fucking admit it)… It’s WRITE A BOOK or TAKE FREELANCE GIGS.
Which extends to your bitterness about me taking up space on your blog. Because unlike you guys, I DON’T HAVE some lame website or unread blog with ZERO COMMENTS, I’m not ON THE INSIDE and I don’t have your OH SO IMPRESSIVE credentials when it comes to NAME DROPPING (“Edgar Wright is my facebook friend!!!”)… I’m just some sadsack open-mike comic and wannabe actor, and I got Poland, Wells giving me props and ink space, I got GLOBAL MEDIA OUTLETS running my better rants. Trust me, NOBODY knows who I am either, so that’s not a brag, but how’s it feel that you guys take all this shit SO DEADLY SERIOUS, and it’s threads ABOUT ME that gets dozens and dozens of replies? I’m bigger than Lubitsch on Some Came Running!
Really, I came here because I thought you were a cool dude… Hell, you were in GIRLFRIEND EXPERIENCE with SASHA GREY, so I figured this dude’s gotta be cool, or he’s gotta have the hookup with mad pussy. But, nope, just an AGING hipster (a BAND at age 51?), a condescending COCK with an enormous ego. But by all means, go on with the BORING discussions about increasingly irrelevant, antiquated shit, all the while circle-jerking with your sycophants who wouldn’t dare to call out what a classist, snobbish, self-important gasbag fucking bloward stiff you are.
Bitch.
The fact that “Lazarus” has been lamely skulking all these blogs and boards for at least the four years I have, and seems to clock in ONLY to make fun of people or complain about shit, must be taken in conjunction with the fact that he’s NEVER ONCE let on anything about himself– what he does, what his job is, what he looks like, if he has any credits, writing or film… He’s an absolute blank slate who never lets on ANYTHING, the easiest kind of “troll,” if we’re throwing that stupid term around. And when you add up the “You suck you suck you’re an asshole I am awesome” shit but without ANYTHING let on to back it up, you can only draw ONE conclusion: Laz is, like me, a 37-year-old guy with no credits, who can’t back up anything he says, whose life is as miserable as mine or anybody else’s. Somehow I doubt Tom Hanks clocks onto blogs just to put other people down… and I doubt anyone whose circumstances match mine to a FUCKING T would take my rants as seriously as you do, or McDouche does… I pissed you off because the stuff I’m saying is the stuff you repress while you namedrop and talk up YOUR shit that’s never, ever going to catch fire.
At least I’m honest about my desperation, and not fooling myself that I’m in any way superior to anyone, or that I have any chance of actually making it. And, hell, you’re not as funny, talented, or well-liked as I am even in these paltry circles, so what chance do you have?
But, hey, Laz, show me your IMDB page or Twitter account or even a BLOG or ANYTHING that proves you DO ANYTHING except bitch. Or is the truth you have to keep it 1000% anonymous because if I saw any of your work I’d tear it a new asshole?
Yeah, look at GLENN KENNY rocking out!
You’re so hardcore, Elwood.
ART BRUT. Shirt should’ve said ART BITCH.
And tell me you weren’t thinking of co-star Sasha when you fucked your wife those weeks you were filming, old fuck.
Now go fill up my Taurus. 20 bucks on pump 8, bald bitch.
FAILURE. LOSER. LIFE OVER.
This guy actually has fans? Really?
I stopped reading Poland and am on the verge of stopping with Wells as well, all because they pander to the one-dimensional annoying fool. And now he turns up here?
It’s like a virus. Get rid of him.
And yet YOU have never posted ANYTHING INTERESTING EVER.
But by all means, take my load like a good little bitch, trans-mogrifier (NICE NAME DORK.)
Take it bitch.
Oh and make sure to TIP the UNEMPLOYED MIDDLE AGED, DEPRESSING BALD FAILURE on your way out.
A TIP JAR. And again, funny, Glenn NEVER acknowledges or compliments ANY OF HIS REGULAR READERS, like a good WHORE he just takes your money and laughs all the way to the bank. Has Glenn even EVER acknowledged ANY of the comments on his bunk-ass SHITTY blog?
You guys pay him to CONDESCEND TO YOU. Instead tell him to get a nice bookstore job like the TOTAL FAILURE he is.
Lex: now say goodnight.…
“Any motherfucker, who says in any given situation, that his dick ain’t worth a shit, is telling a lie…”-James Toback (without ever visiting any of the numerous boards you’ve posted on).