Hello the Internet, and welcome to this episode of trend Stein where wind trend Stein's money. I am Jack, That is Jam McNabb, writer on the dailies like Geist, what's going on? So much is going on? Jack? So much? I know? Well, ben Stein's name is trending. I did have to do the young people check and ask superproducer Becca and super producer Victor if they knew who ben Stein was. They they affirmed that they did thanks to
Ferris Bueller the lasting impact of the film Ferris Bueller. Um, So ben Stein still out here occupying space in people's brains and trending on Twitter today for reasons that I would have assumed were death related. Yeah, me too. I thought he died, But no, he hash He was complaining about pancake syrup. Yeah he had a hot he had a hot one that he had to let go. Yeah, it's a it's a video of him not looking great,
looking a little bent over. Stoops. It's been it's been a while since we've seen ben Stein in the flesh, and old age has not been kind to Ben No. I I honestly I thought he was about one hundred and eight years old and had to google it and he's only like seventy nine. Yeah, because you know, people trying to win your money just ages you. And he's just up all night worried about all the people coming
for his coin. But yeah, so he posted a video where he complained that his bottle of ant Jemima syrup used to feature quote a large African American woman chef, but due to the inherent racism of America's corporate culture.
Uh he it seemed like he wanted to be like, it features I think, he says, but now because of the racism, it features a white person, and then like noticed that it didn't and was like features, I mean no person, I mean nothing at all, just avoid and it's like, should should we do take two, Ben where you don't say it's a white person? That no, just in the ancient art of improv and just kind of riffing up here. But yeah, I mean he he got the camera up, had the thought, got the camera up,
and yeah, it's a it's an old take. I would say, that's one one way of putting it right. Yeah, Like the it's just so like people were even pointing out online that, like because now it's the products a whole different name like for it to have been called Antremima and have no logo at all, and not have the new name which is like pearl mining milling company. Milling company. Yeah, not mining, they're not. You don't get the syrup from mining.
But for for it to be that specific product, like it would have had to be like a two year old bottle of syrup. Because everyone took his money twenty five years ago. He can't afford syrup anymore. Yeah. So yeah, very dated from very specific period of time. It's very curious why anyone still cares what he has to say.
But I do think like people probably generally, you know, they're aware of him from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, maybe from his game show wind Benstein's Money, which helped launch the career of Jimmy Kimmel was a former Nixon lackey. And yeah, is also like a deep right wing ideologue, like a creationist. Yeah. He made like that whole documentary
about like how they shouldn't teach evolution in school. Yeah I remember, yeah, yeah, and he's like he went to Yale but somehow ended up as a as a creationist, which I don't know. Once again, like it feels like maybe A lot of the mystique of these Ivy League schools comes from the fact that they've just only given jobs to each other in the halls of power, right for the past two centuries. And so we end up with Ben Stein letting the cat out of the bag
maybe a little bit. Why should not listen to every character actor from classic eighties comedies? Right? And I have to remind myself of that all the time. Yeah, be skeptical, like, don't just believe what the principle from the Breakfast Club tells you. Yeah, And I have a fall victim to that. I've lost millions in Ponzi schemes to various police Academy past members. So yeah, it's a dangerous world out there for those of us who were raised on eighties pop
culture and just inherently trust it. It is Fat Tuesday. Carnival is happening in Brazil, one of the biggest parties in the world. This is a pre Lenten festival celebrated around the world Brazil, most famously Italy, Spain, New Orleans is I guess the Mardi Gras as a version of this, But yeah, it's it's time to pack in all the drinking and eating because we're all about to starve ourselves during lent am I right, everybody, everybody on the same page about that, Right, That's just how I do it.
Every week. I just like, I eat a bunch one day and drink a bunch, and then the next day I'm sober and I fast. Yeah yeah, and perpetually I've had several heart attacks. And it's really kind of out of sync with the way other people because you party your hardest on Tuesday, which is usually not the day everybody else reserves for partying hard, but you just go all in on Tuesday, and then it's the day I used to party when like CDs and DVDs all came out on Tuesday. That was what a time to be
alive when we just yeah, yeah, I remember. This is kind of a tangent, But I had a friend that worked in like the big a big bookstore in Toronto, like one of the chain bookstores, And this was when Prince was living in Toronto, and he used to come in every Tuesday with like his entourage and would just buy every single CD that came out that day. That didn't matter what, it was, just everything that came into
the store. He bought and yeah, r I P. Yeah, there are stories about that, like with you know, directors and movie stars and stuff out in LA like that used to just be a real status symbol. It's like you would buy all the DVDs like when they came out and now look at us. But you know, Fat Tuesday, get ready to put some ash on your forehead. Catholics the day that put ourselves out there to be you know, marked for death by the CIA. If the Kennedy assassination
is any indication. Wait what, I'm just saying that they're not fond of Catholics. Jeff Kok the first Catholic president. My people are you know, always on the lookout as supers or Brian just said, don't get me started on this. Arianna Debose, Academy Award winner for her role in West Side Story Super Talented Artist, hosted the seventy sixth annual Baptas and started the show with a song that celebrated
the various nominees. And like I'm trying to picture in my mind, like compare it to like the Billy Crystal songs, you know, when he would just come out and sing a song at the beginning of the Oscars back when he hosted the Oscars, and like instead of jokes, it
was just like references to the movies. Yeah, like that's kind of what it feels like, but even more like it almost feels more like a like rap song that your HR department would make for a training video, right at that level of just like this runs with this and it is what we're talking about, you know, like just like going through a list and finding word that rhyme and here we go on to the next one. And people are disagreeing about whether it's camp or whether
it's cringe on the internet. I am reserving judgment for I need to study it further, But Jam, do you have a position? Is it cringe? Is it camp? I think it's closer to camp. I yeah, because there's something about it, like I've probably watched it thirty times by now, because I check there's it's it's both objectively bad and completely rewatchable, and also like there's something to it that
is fascinating the world, but it's also not good. I think part of it may be like the reason why no one's totally sure what to call it is like she is super talented, you know, it was working with not great material, you know, like Billy Crystal is not a super talented you know, singer and dancer, so those were just you know, silly, where this is like, you know, she's committing to something that is stupid and probably shouldn't
have been done. It's also like weird that she was hosting at all, Like it's always a bad idea when you're like a hot young talent and you host an award show, Like it didn't work the one time that had happened in my lifetime with like James Franco and Anne Hathaway. I would not compar to that. I don't know, like no, but just in terms of a career decision,
I would. I actually probably like defend this a bit more than like some of the people on the internet like yeah, I was it was pretty dumb, but also like, yeah, I grew up with Billy Crystal, which was real bad,
really bad. And then also I think what also did this the bit no service was the way it was edited because like she's singing and like I guess I'll call it rapping, but rapping like all of these names, and they do the Awards show thing where they cut to that actor to get their reaction, but she's listing them off so quickly. They're having a cut to people
so fast. It's like the whole thing just felt really jarring. Yeah, I mean, I think the cringiest part of it is the part that isn't being shared online as much, which is at the end of like rattling off all the actors and directors names, they start singing, we are family. I don't know if you got that far in the I didn't know. Yeah, Like that seems like, okay, I don't know if I can defend this anymore. Yeah, but
the rest of it was just I don't know them. Also, the BAFTAs through Ariana Debos and her team under the bus and said it was their idea and not the bathtub, which I always like the producers of award shows feel like they need to get over themselves. I think just generally they should be like, yeah, it's stupid, but it's an award show, and like protect their talent. But this reminds me of like when the Grammy's through Frank Ocean under the bus and we're like, he doesn't cooperate with
our vision. Like the Grammys award producers are like very self serious and like take their craft of award show production like very seriously, and that just just be like, yeah, we're we do a stupid thing and this one didn't land, but we'll try try again next year. I guess our idea. Yeah, it's so silly like that. The other thing is like I watch all the you know, like I watched the Oscars and stuff, and it's there's so many goofy bits that don't land. It's like, this is not even the
worst the bunch. Yeah, as super producer Brian put A, trade shows are supposed to be cringe and that's what these all are. Whether they want to be like dressed up as like Hollywood's Night of Bright Stars or you know, the night that Hollywood Stars shine the brightest. It's just people who work in the same industry awarding each other.
And you know, yeah, and you know what, that performance got everybody talking about the BAFTAs, which I can't remember the last time that four D chess is what you're talking about, baptis the thing that you're so eager to get away from you that's called four D chess. And it's the only reason I've ever watched the BAFTAs other than that, one. I think it was a Kanye performance with the Flamethrowers. It was pretty dope. But yeah, anyways, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. And
we're back. And so there's a lot of wild weather happening. Tornado, winter storm on the East Coast in New York, New Jersey this week. Those aren't supposed to happen near one another. Strange weather coming to California. So I don't know, just weird times. It's crazy. I heard two women on the bus the other day and one of them was like, oh, he has like climate change. Oh so crazy. We've never haven't we don't have spring anymore, Like, we don't have
we don't have spring or proper winters. And she was like, and we haven't since the seventies And I was like, what, I've never experienced a real spring in my life. Yeah yeah that Oh man, spring used to be amazing. Man, you just yeah, yeah, I missed it. Yeah. And finally The Bachelor finally caught COVID. We've been waiting for it to happen for a while. Apparently the Bachelor like has to basically create an NBA bubble, like the what the NBA did with the bubble, like they just do that
every season to try and prevent a COVID outbreak. But Zach tested positive for COVID, forcing you know, just a lot of awkward, you know, a rose ceremony the iPad, I believe, or a virtual cocktail party via iPad. I don't watch the fucking Bachelor, you guys, but it's in case that isn't obvious. But do you watch The Bachelor? Jam No, no, I've seen it, but I don't watch regularly.
I think the like bubble, like NBA bubble thing they did like when COVID started, because they were like, you know, like everything's shutting down, like whole industries are collapsing, like healthcare workers are exhausted. We really need to like pare down and make sure we get the Bachelor made, because yeah, the world will grind to a halt if if the Bachelor stopped. So that's when they and they were right, we needed that ship, we needed that, we needed the
last dance, we needed Tiger King. Yeah. So okay, so apparently this one, yeah was the ahead them in the Bahamas London, so they're they're just traveling all over the place and caught covid Like, uh, like one is want to do if traveling all over the place. Yeah, it seemed kind of inevitable, but and it I guess I don't know how these production schedules work. Like you would think they could just wait till he didn't have covid R to finish it, but instead there Yeah, they did
it all virtually. They had like a Zoom Rose ceremony, the Zoom Rose Ceremony. Actually, Super producer Brian is pointing out that because like the end of The Bachelor announces the next bachelorette, and it's sort of this inextricable cycle, like you you can't delay it. You would have to like actually stop the calendar like you were just the date would be the same for like a couple of
weeks in a row. If you just delayed The Bachelor, like the actual calendar, all of the dates that we're working with, they would just stop it on February twenty first until they were able to make new episodes. That makes sense. Yeah, so it's just a never ending chain of The Bachelor. It's like, we don't recognize this, but Christmas, Thanksgiving and New Year's are all determined by when the Bachelor comes out and as a finale that explains why I buy all of my family roses single roses for
Chris Ross. All right, well, we're all hoping Zach feels better even though he caught COVID probably like were or five months ago now or I don't know how long it takes them to turn this shit around, but I don't know. All right, Thank you, jam Where can people find you? Follow you all that good stuff? Oh, you can find me on Twitter at j m mcnavigant. All right, those are some of the things that are trending on this Tuesday, February twenty First, we are back tomorrow with
the whole last episode of the show. Until then, be kind to each other, be kind to yourselves, get the vaccine, don't do nothing about white supremacy, and we will talk to you all tomorrow. Fights