At around midnight on a recent Friday night in the Poconos, television personality and geek humorist John Hodgman was shouting trivia questions about the character actor Vincent Schiavelli (you know him). "What actress, married to Vincent Schiavelli for many years, played Agnes DiPesto on 'Moonlighting'?" he asked. The question was met with groans of confusion (the answer, which I only learned just now by Googling it, is Allyce Beasley).

There were 200 or so of us in the audience, seated around the giant, slightly antiseptic ballroom of the Inn at Pocono Manor. It was the first night of complicated cultural happening MaxFun Con East, a weekend convention celebrating the [...]

You there! Go listen to "How Was Your Week?", a new podcast from Awl pal Julie Klausner. The first episode "features an interview with authoress/ provacateur[/Awl pal] Natasha Vargas-Cooper, a rundown of the Best Picture nominees from Julie's parents, an unfavorable review of The King's Speech, and the debut of a new title for something that we will use, one day: Oscar Madison Won't Let You Pack Your Bags." It's here, or here if you want it from iTunes.

Julie Klausner: You and I are, it's safe to say, closet Camille Paglia appreciators.

Natasha Vargas-Cooper: Safe.

Julie: Closeted because she occasionally says crazy craziness, like when she wanted to rub herself all over Sarah Palin.

Natasha: Her political stuff is bonko but I intensely adore her cultural criticism.

Julie: When she got "politikul," twas a folly. Yet, I think Paglia is a better writer than her fellow agitators like say your Katie Roiphe.

Natasha: Don't bait me with my love of Katie Roiphe.

Julie: She's also funny, she can spin an adjective and she's persuasive.

Natasha: I love Paglia because she's she's bawdy [...]

After 1981's "Merrily We Roll Along" flopped, Stephen Sondheim, American music's last living Genius with a capital "G" (sorry, David Byrne!), lapsed into a depression so severe, he considered quitting musical theater to write video games and mystery novels instead. Yes, video games! Can you imagine the reception "Into The Woods for PSP" could've gotten at Comic-Con?

Our brave host Emily Gould brings Julie Klausner into her home kitchen-very daring!-for a talk about boys, memoirs and how to make kugel. Julie's book: I Don't Care About Your Band. And: kugel! It's not just for Jews any more. Cooking the Books is directed by Valerie Temple and shot and edited by Andrew Gauthier.

Julie Klausner: I am under the impression that you loved the new Nicole Hosen-feffer Incorporated movie, "Please Give."

Tyler Coates: I did! I also knew going into the movie that I would love it, as Nicole Holofcener is the BEST.

Julie: "Please Give" me your take on it, har har.

Tyler: (I see what you did there, right there.)

Julie: I, too, am a big fan of Mizz Hoffasenna. How did this one compare to her/their past movies for you? [Oh and there are spoilers ahead, for sure.]

Young Sherlock Holmes Why: Walked into the wrong movie theater; had intended to see Spies like Us.

Last night was Dog News Daily's Golden Collar Awards in Los Angeles, and Awl pal Julie Klausner was there.

"My girlfriend wants to move to another country where there are more job opportunities but a much higher crime rate. I’m terrified of going, as I don’t think I’d ever fit in and feel safe walking the streets (which I love to do), but there’s no future where we live now, and I don’t think I’d ever make enough money to even move out of my parents’ house. What should I do?" —Awl pal Julie Klausner's advice column is pretty much what you'd expect, which is to say hysterical.

Julie Klausner: A big pet peeve of mine is when people confuse Bob Fosse's stiff jazz hands for spirit fingers.

Natasha Vargas-Cooper: UGH! Jazz hands are like Lady Liberty's crown of spikes. They make a precise statement. Spirit fingers are for RENAISSANCE FAIRE WEIRDOS.

Julie: They're deeply sexual, Fosse's hands, especially when you consider that he stuck his troll pole in every chorus girl.

With this introduction, we begin a brief series on the recent life of the American musical. No, for real! The hideous, hilarious, wonderful, big-business of musical theater. This series is guest-edited by our own Natasha Vargas-Cooper.

Natasha Vargas-Cooper: Julie! Are musicals, as a genre, dead?

Julie Klausner: You startled me! What are you doing in my home? Wearing my favorite shirt-dress!

Natasha: Nobody expects the musical inquisition.

Monday marks the unofficial beginning of summer. For Here Comes Summer, we asked folks to explain its magic. And is there anything more magical than appearing on TV?

"God gives each of us only what we can handle" was advice a lesbian bike messenger and Brussels Griffon owner gave me when I expressed guilt about our relative suffering. She had just shared with me a harrowing story about growing up poor in the South with a father who sexually abused her, following my own disclosure that I had a terrible time at sleep-away camp when I was ten.

Now that he is tasked for real with directing the adaptation of The Emperor's Children, we must take Noah Baumbach for serious again. And so….

Natasha Vargas-Cooper: What was it like for you to go on a Bromotional journey into Ben Stiller's Acting cred? How was it spending 2 hours with a character you HATED?

Julie Klausner: It was better than dating one! But I did like the movie.

Natasha: Have you dated a G-berg?

Julie: YES!!

Natasha: Ok, Explain what a G-man is.

Julie: Somebody who thinks honesty is not only a value, but THE MOST IMPORTANT VALUE. But honesty should be a [...]

I began the decade with a Kim's Video membership and an unslakable thirst for documentaries about crazy people. I'd rent their only VHS of Chicken Hawk, a doc about NAMBLA members, that featured a particularly memorable monologue from a yellow turtleneck aficionado about something he called "gentle time."

Natasha: Okay, what did you think of Techno Roman Madonna and her 13th legion last night?

Julie: Well, to me, Madonna is like the Catholic Church or Penn State. I’ll defend anything she does, even when she's guilty. I’m loyal to the institution.

Natasha: What did you think of her football fruits?

Julie: I thought they were great.

Natasha: DON'T LIE!!

Julie: I thought she should have worn different shoes.

Natasha: This is like when the Catholic Church or Penn State blamed a sex abuse scandal on a couple bad apples!

Julie: The medley was tight, the concepts were good, it looked great and I'd say she sounded [...]

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Is there an NYC "I hate/ don't do well with Christmas" support group? Need to talk thru some ish.less than a minute ago via webJulie Klausnerjulieklausner

Awl pal Julie Klausner expresses a sentiment so many of us are feeling right now. I think it may have something to do with all the enforced happiness. Also, the inescapable torture of Andy Williams' exhortation about it being the most wonderful time of [...]

30. sweet

29. ambitious

28. anthroprmorphic

27. topsy-turvy

26. unrecognizable

• Katy Perry bends over to allow suited day traders to snort colored sugar off her back with Pixy Stix straws. • Katy Perry solders together both of the Twix bars that come in the wrapper to make a candy version of a double dildo, then shrugs.

• Kzar Alfel Chan-Eusebio im taking my girlfriends:)

• Daria Blake Walton My aunt!

• Luigi Pepe whoever…

• Rachelle Sexton My friend Tammy Ward!

• Ibrahim Kardashian Idk

Once upon a time, our pal Julie Klausner went on a date with a man she'll call "Rob." This relationship is among quite a few quite vividly covered in her new nonfiction book, I Don't Care About Your Band, which is out today. Just now! This is where you can buy it on Amazon. Go ahead, we'll wait. You should know that this book's subtitle is "What I Learned from Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux-Sensitive Hipsters, and Other Guys I've Dated." Highly descriptive, and also accurate! Anyway, back to Rob. We were quite taken with this excerpt because she manages to both memoir and [...]