The Light from the TV Shows: A Chat with Kelly Lynch (“Magic City”)

I can’t vouch for anyone else’s experience with the phenomenon of “going viral,” but in mine, when you collaborate with someone and the resulting effort ends up being viewed by literally millions of people, it creates somewhat of a bond between you, mostly because…well, it’s just weird, y’know? Or maybe it’s just weird for me because more people know about a story Kelly Lynch told me in our Random Roles conversation for the AV Club – you know, the one about how Bill Murray or one of his brothers will call Lynch’s husband, Mitch Glazer, whenever “Road House” is on, just so they can say, “Your wife’s having sex with Patrick Swayze right now” – than have ever read any other interview I’ve ever done in my entire career.

Either way, I’ve kept in touch with Ms. Lynch ever since that phone interview, getting to meet her and Mr. Glazer in person a few months later and earlier this month I was even invited to ask her and Danny Huston a few questions when they made an appearance on Huffington Post Live. After we wrapped up that brief virtual encounter (they were in the studio, I did my bit via Google+ Hangouts), I sent her a hopeful Tweet, saying, “Maybe we can still do a proper interview to talk about Season 2 of ‘Magic City.'” The next thing you know, we were back on the phone with each other, talking about where we’ll see her character, Meg Bannock, headed this season, how she handles work-related discussions with her husband, and how awesome it is to see Sherilyn Fenn turn up on the series.

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Bullz-Eye: How are you?

Kelly Lynch: I’m good! Well, I’m surviving. Mitch had a big party up at our house last night for his post-production group, who are some of the best post people I’ve ever been involved with. I mean, from sound to the music to the CG…they’re just amazing. A lot of them have never done TV, don’t want to do TV, and won’t do TV, but they’ve been Glazed, as we say. [Laughs.] He’s a beloved guy, and they just fell in love with the show and fell in love with Mitch. So we had a food truck and a bar with  mojitos and margaritas and stuff. We still have a pitcher of margaritas in my fridge that’s calling my name. I keep going, “No!” So I’m surviving, but needless to say, I had a few more margaritas last night, and I may yet have a few more today. But it was really fun, and it was really great to be able to say “thanks” to all those guys and gals. Half of the show is putting it all together.

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Hidden Netflix Gems: Bottle Rocket

This week’s Hidden Netflix Gem: “Bottle Rocket” (1996)

Before Wes Anderson was a household name (at least among movie buffs), before receiving Oscar nominations for The Royal Tenenbaums, Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Moonrise Kingdom, before The Darjeeling Limited, Rushmore, and The Life Aquatic, yes, before all of that, he and Owen Wilson co-wrote the screenplay for Bottle Rocket. It was based on a short film of the same name they’d made in 1992 and released in 1994. Bottle Rocket was Anderson’s directorial debut and marked the first appearances of Luke and Owen Wilson, as well as their lesser known older brother, AndrewLeslie Mann, now famous for her many roles in husband Judd Apatow’s films, even had a small part, though it was eventually left on the cutting room floor.

Anderson’s first film is an interesting look back at the development of filmmaker’s now signature style: the methodical cinematography, with its bright coloring and compulsive need to center-frame the actors, along with humor so dry you’d better pack a canteen. Though a commercial failure, Bottle Rocket served as a launching pad for the careers of all those names above, so easily recognized here in 2013. But the film is worth a watch on its own merits, even for those who aren’t intrigued by the idea of taking a look at the early work of a couple of future A-listers. Thanks to Anderson’s burgeoning style and its innocent, humorous characters, Bottle Rocket has been certified fresh and holds an 80 percent rating on the TomatoMeter. If that’s not enough to sway you, Martin Scorsese named it his seventh favorite movie of the 1990’s. Yes, that Martin Scorsese.

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Interview with Jesse Jane, porn star and actress in “Middle Men”

To use the Hollywood pitch technique, “Middle Men” is “GoodFellas” with porn, an amusing story of a businessman (Luke Wilson) who helps two guys with a great idea make millions of dollars by giving customers a way to purchase pornography online discreetly. The more he gets involved in the business, though, the harder it is for him to stay clean, as the job frequently forces him to deal with gangsters and scumbags. Fittingly, to promote the DVD release of “Middle Men” (it comes out tomorrow), the studio recruited porn star Jesse Jane, who’s in the movie for a good two to three seconds (no joke), to do interviews. A scheduling snafu relegated the chat to email-only (let’s just say that porn stars are very busy the week of the Super Bowl), but Miss Jane answered our questions within an hour of receiving them. You’ll forgive us for cleaning up the text speak, but we just couldn’t bring ourselves to put ‘lol’ in an interview.

Bullz-Eye: So what events do you have planned in Dallas?

Jesse Jane: I have 3 different Super Bowl parties at the Manhattan Lounge, and Iniquity. I also have a store signing, and a bunch of radio and I’m shooting a cable thing and something for HD Net.

BE: I saw the movie, and the sequences with the porn stars are cut pretty quickly, but I’m sure I saw you in the Vegas scene posing next to Luke Wilson, and getting a couple of lines. Did I miss anything else?

JJ: No that was it, just a small cameo part which was fun to shoot.

BE: How many days did you spend on the set?

JJ: I literally flew into Vegas, shot that day, and left the next morning.

BE: Did you have any personal dealings with the people the movie is based on?

JJ: No. The Internet thing started when I was still in school, so I’ve never met any of the guys that this movie is based on.

BE: Is there any of yourself in the Audrey Dawns character?

JJ: Actually no, I didn’t sleep with people to get ahead. I was just good in bed (Laughs), but I’ve never mixed business relationships with my personal relationships; that just never ends good.

BE: Talk about the differences between the Hollywood set and the ones you work on at Digital Playground.

JJ: Well, honestly, there’s just a lot more people on the mainstream set, and on my sets we have sex. (Laughs)

BE: Is acting in mainstream movies something you want to explore further?

JJ: I would love to get little parts here and there, it’s so much fun. But I’m not looking to cross over. I’m a sex symbol – I’m known for being a sex star.

BE: How do you feel about the adult entertainment industry’s steady move into mainstream culture? Do you think it’s great, or do even porn stars find it a little strange?

JJ: I think it’s amazing. People are realizing we are just people too, and some of us can act. Just because we have sex for a living doesn’t change us as people. It’s never going to completely cross over, so people need to realize that, but it’s fun they’re experimenting with it

BE: What are your thoughts on what I call the amateur/reality circuit of porn (Note: we listed the name of a few sites here as examples, but will not print them here), where you have full-fledged porn stars pretending to be first-timers? Is that good for the industry because it means more work for everyone, or is it bad because of the cheap production values and for forcing professional adult actors have to pretend to be reality stars? (Forgive me if this is a ridiculous question; I’ve never interviewed a porn star before.)

JJ: I guess it’s fine. I don’t shoot that stuff, but it helps other people, so that’s a good thing. It’s not my type of thing; I’m used to shooting higher quality films

BE: Adult films by nature are made on the cheap, but you’ve made some pretty elaborate ones. Tell us which one had the most big-budget effect or set.

JJ: Well, Digital Playground movies are huge budgets, and not cheap. Take “Pirates” and “Pirates 2,” for example, over million dollar budgets. We put money into our films to provide something that makes you want to watch.

BE: If a 16-year-old girl came up to you and told you that she wanted to be a porn star when she was old enough, what would you tell her?

JJ: To wait a few years – she might change her mind. If [she decides to go ahead with it], you need to not be embarrassed about it because people will find out. You can’t hide it, and you must enjoy sex, because people that do it just for the money won’t last.

BE: What are your plans once you decide to stop making movies?

JJ: I’m launching my own tequila in March – Diosa tequila launches March 7-9 at the biggest nightclub and bar convention in Vegas.

Click to buy Middle Men from Amazon