So nothing more from the mice, which leads me to believe they were naught but a hallucination. Slightly fitting given
the follow up to that Fist of Fun sketch. Though on my way back from the Simpson's Movie Premiere I did notice the tramp stool still in place outside the primary school. So I am not going completely mad.
Oh yes, that's right. I went to The Simpson's Movie Premiere. That's right, look impressed.
Except don't. I am strongly of the opinion that any celebrity event to which I am invited is not worth attending. I get invited to very few things and usually when I do it is really some kind
of veiled insult. But really, if I have made the guest list then something is going to be awry. Just as if I get nominated for an award,
humiliation is not far away. I really should have more of a handle on my (lack of) status.
But I don't learn. When I got invited to the Simpson's premiere I was genuinely excited. I am a massive fan of this show, certainly of the first couple of hundred episodes, though I feel it has lost it's way a bit more recently, moving away from being a charming and exceptionally witty look at the smaller things in life towards more ludicrous plot-lines and broader comedy. I still think it's worth watching and better than most stuff on TV by miles, but it's not what it once was. But then who is? And to have produced over 100 exceptional episodes of anything is an amazing achievement.
So I still love the show dearly, even though it has very slightly let me down more recently and was thrilled to be going to the premiere. I imagined they would really push the boat out and have people dressed up as the characters and that the stars and creators of the show would be there, as well as loads of really amazing celebs. I'd probably get a goody bag that I could cherish for all eternity or sell on ebay, whichever came first.
I had a plus one and wanted to take someone who would be equally excited by this jammy opportunity, and thought that had to be TV's Emma Kennedy. She gleefully accepted my invitation, but then had to pull out at the last minute due to circumstances beyond her control. She was gutted. Ha ha ha. But I told her I might give her something out of my goody bag.
So instead I took another old friend, Ben Moor, who I knew would be similarly delighted and impressed.
It started out looking like it might be special. The screening was at the O2 Dome (I am only calling it that because I can't spell Millennium) and we were offered a free ride on the Thames Clipper riverboat from the London Eye. James Nesbitt from off of Jekyll was on the boat drinking champagne. I couldn't wait to see what other stars had made it along.
Once at the Dome we were corralled down a yellow road, going by saxophonists playing the theme tune and crowds of excited people waiting to see "the stars". I was given a Homer Simpson mask on a stick. There was a few hoardings with Simpsons drawings on them. Photographers waited by one section to take pictures of the celebs. If it was like this outside, then what would it be like when we got in there. Ben and I bumped into the guys from "We Are Klang", a childish and brilliant sketch troupe (who I saw
back when I was thin. They aren't exactly big stars yet (they probably will be though), but surely there would be loads more proper celebs inside and it was good to not be the worst celebrity on offer. Though most of the people on the yellow carpet with us and in the boat had not been famous at all. It was an ominous sign. They seemed to be giving tickets to ordinary members of the public who hadn't even been on BBC4's "The Book Quiz" and spaces that could easily have been given to people from old series of Big Brother seemed to be taken up by disabled children. I could sense there was something wrong going on.
Inside the multiplex cinema it became clear that we wouldn't be going into one big star-studded screening, introduced by Matt Groening, with Harry Shearer doing a Mr Burns voice. Each of the nine screens was showing the film and would start when the cinema was full. That's not a premiere- that's an advance screening. I had rushed to get there early as I had thought it started at 6.45, but it was clear that if we had turned up later we could have just gone to one of the later showings.
And there was no-one famous there at all and none of the stars of the film, not even people dressed up. All we were given was a Simpson's ice lolly, a bottle of water and a KitKat.
Still, I was going to see the film and had high hopes that it would be a return to blistering form. I really wanted it to be good. And there was a microphone set up in front of the screen, so maybe there would be at least one other celebrity in the room with me, Ben Moor and one of the blokes from Klang (due to them randomly doling out screen numbers, the Klang boys had been split up).
Then someone came to the microphone. He looked very vaguely familiar and quite grumpy. "Hi," he said in a quite half-arsed fashion, "I am Joel from JK and Joel" (the radio 1 DJs grandad), "JK was meant to be here too, but he's stuck in traffic." This was adding insult to injury. I had hoped for at the least Nancy Cartwright to come on and say something, but instead we had one half of a quite obscure radio duo, who didn't look like he wanted to be there and had nothing to do with the Simpsons. The audience were underwhelmed. Everyone knows that JK is the talented one. Joel is riding on his coat-tails.
Joel pressed on, acting like he was a big star and that this was beneath him. He went on about how we mustn't film the film on our phones (which had been made very clear several times already) adding that there were men with night vision goggles who would kick us out if we did. This made it seem not like a big build up to an exciting movie event, but that he had just been paid to come on and warn us about stealing from the film company. He was trying to be flippant and cool, but in front of an audience where there was a large proportion of excited kids (and excited grown up kids) this was a bit like pissing on a bonfire. He tried to joke about how he had been filming a film on his phone recently- it didn't really work. Then he half-heartedly did his job by trying to whip up some excitement. "It's the new Simpson's Movie. You're going to be the first to see this. Has anyone seen it yet?"
He of course expected everyone to shout out "No!" which a few people did, but one over-excited child who probably wanted the grumpy unfamous man to go away so the film could start, accidentally shouted "Yes!"
Joel attempted to work with this and get some business out of it, but it didn't really work. "Who said that?" he asked a little too aggressively, "Come up here!" He was going to get the child out of the audience. "Come on, come up here!" Perhaps he had a prize or a treat for the youngster. Or was he just going to interrogate him and ask him how he had seen the film and demand some money for the film company? The reluctant child finally came up and Joel kept up his uncharming banter, not asking the kid's name or getting a round of applause for him, slightly intimidating him and accusing him of being a pirate. It must be going somewhere good.
Then Joel said, "Would you like to meet Bart Simpson?"
The frightened child's face brightened. "Yes!" he trilled.
"He's not here," said Joel and pushed the youngster back to his seat. If only JK had been there he would have kept Joel in hand and made this work, but on his own Joel is a loose cannon, who hates the world and all that is in it. Finally he sloped off and the film began.
I have to say that the first five minutes seemed very promising, it felt like the film was going to be quite subversive and funny, but perhaps it was riding on the anticipation and good will of the crowd. Because aside from one visual gag involving a young boy's genitals there was nothing in the entire film that made everyone in the cinema laugh out loud. It was engaging enough and certainly not terrible, but it was, for my money, not a tenth of what it could and should have been. It was the new, much too stupid and unsympathetic Homer, rather than the old flawed, but loveable one. And the plot overtook the characters and hardly any of the peripheral favourites got a look-in. I think Empire
cover it pretty accurately.
So not only was it not a proper premiere, the film was not very good either. We popped into the aftershow party, but it was a moribund affair, with no stupid reality show contestants to laugh at and warm white wine. I don't want to appear churlish, like some kind of Joel from JK and Joel, but after all the anticipation it was a bit of a let-down. I must learn. If I am invited it really isn't worth going.
So we left the party and Ben, me and one of the blokes from We Are Klang went for some Italian food, which was much more fun and we then got the tube home early, thus luckily missing out on chaos later on, when the transport system couldn't cope with the number of people coming out of the premiere, party and two major music gigs that were going on.
And on the way home I saw some tramp's day old poo. The experience had been better than that though. If only just.
