My friend Tim Deroche had a hip L.A.-area girlfriend — the sort who’d long sought a pair of Tura Satana boots like the ones in Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! — Laura Lovelace [NOTE: I've corrected this sentence per the Comment below], who was tasked with picking music from her record collection to use as the Pulp Fiction soundtrack (having played the waitress in the opening diner scene). I’m not sure she ever even filled out the contracts entitling her to royalties, seeing the whole music aspect as something of an afterthought, but clearly all Gen Xers in particular probably ought to give her money every time we see her. (Tim’s priorities being quite different from my own, he and the girlfriend eventually broke up in part because he wants kids.)
Laura Lovelace also played a waitress in Tarantino’s Jackie Brown — but that film is not the Jackie Brown that fascinates me today. Rather, I notice McDonald’s running online help-wanted ads about the joys of employment at McDonald’s — something that may be running through the minds of a lot of you lately — that feature a woman named Jackie Brown, who got her first McD gig in 1993 and, as the ad reveals in Before and After photos, is still working there today, a bit older and larger. (The ad then links to the employment site McSuccess.McState.com.)
And much as I love McDonald’s — as does an economist and gourmand from Italy I know, so it’s not just rubes who do — I can’t help wondering whether revealing that someone is still working there sixteen years later is the kind of inspiration the company’s ad department was aiming for. I mean, while I congratulate Ms. Brown, what you want to hear for ad purposes, I think, is something more like “This person started out at McDonald’s twenty years ago — and today is CEO of Boeing.” (I hung out last night with a guy who’s an avowed elitist who sometimes makes jokes about the mentally handicapped, so I hope it hasn’t just worn off on me, but you see what I’m getting at aesthetically.)
I’m just not sure advertising always sends the intended message. Nor do health articles, needless to say. Take this piece “warning” us about specific fattening meals at popular restaurants: Now I want to collect (and eat) them all. I told you yesterday that I’d blog about fast food — and tomorrow’s the three-legged dogs.
11 comments:
On a related note, Helen points out the pathbreaking invention of bacon-flavored vodka:
http://www.geekologie.com/2009/04/crossing_the_line_bacon_flavor.php
We’re all tired of hearing about bacon, but it’s good to hear about Laura Lovelace…who looked fetchingly like Belinda Carlisle in her short appearance in PULP FICTION. It was a real disappointment that we didn’t see more of her in the film.
My bet is that the guys who designed that site are trying to impress a VP of something-or-other at McDonalds, not potential applicants. How many entry-level McDonalds employees will research the company online? How many even read?
I’m late to the game, but some corrections based on insider knowledge are in order:
- Tim’s girlfried was in fact Laura, the sister of former Tarantino squeeze Grace Lovelace. They all worked in the same video store in the “early days” apparently.
- Quentin asked Laura to pick the surf music for Pulp Fiction from her collection, because she’s a human music-o-pedia. (Although someone else suggested Miserlou, and Dick Dale owes that guy a million dollars.)
- She’s not a professional actress, but Tarantino supposedly planned for her to appear as a waitress pouring coffee in the rest of his movies until he & Grace broke up. In fact, I hear tell that Laura was a terrible coffee server and repeatedly spilled on a not-too-amused Amanda Plummer while trying to execute a “jab pour” that Q had in mind.
- No one named Katie is part of the Lovelace clan AFAIK.
Another clarification: though Helen, Michael Malice, and I are all pro-bacon-flavoring in principle (even a crackpot seeking the Loch Ness Monster once used bacon dropped from hot air balloons to try to lure the beast out, saying simply, “Everybody loves bacon”) — unlike the June 19 commenter above — only Malice has tried Bakon, and the report is not good (and you can decide for yourself whether a Jewish man born in the USSR who loved the Tim Burton version of _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_ is an apt judge of bacon-flavored vodka):
http://michaelmalice.com/2009/07/bakon-vodka.html
Todd – How the hell do you remember this stuff? Even when you get it wrong, you seem to be in the right ballpark.
I’ve forwarded your post to Laura…who is still a good friend. I think she will be especially pleased to discover that you remember her obsession with the boots.
In my effort to prove myself to be the *best boyfriend ever* (a quest which I have long since given up), I searched high and low to find Laura those amazingly cool boots…which she always referred to as “shangri-la boots”…basically black leather go-go boots with the short, thin Sabrina heel.
Always interesting to read gossip about myself. I find it more enlightening that you, the blogger, remembered the things about me you thought were cool, but couldn’t remember my name. At least I’ve always liked the name Katie or Kate (a la Hepburn).
Sorry about that, Ms. Lovelace, and thanks for your substantial assist to the culture.
Interested in your 3 legged dog blog(you’re probably going to regret ever mentioning me). I’m taking a wild guess, but you probably think they’re silly and the owners are being selfish. I strongly disagree. I do think the dog must be considered. I have a 3 legged dog. He had a cancerous tumor on his right front paw. Instead of letting it grow, or putting him through radiation-expensive and no guarantee of effectiveness- I chose to have his leg amputated . He had trouble with his balance at first,especially peeing. After the stitches were removed, and the hair grew back-so it doesn’t look so gruesome, he is doing amazingly well. He always loved to run, so the decision made me very sad. Now I kid him that he was too athletic, ran too fast, jumped too high, was too handsome, apparently something had to happen to level the playing field for other dogs. I’m pro-diversity. In people and animals. What I do find ridiculous is the medical costs. Universal health care is a hot topic, but I have always maintained that we should be able to count our animals as dependents, and have health insurance cover them also.
I’ve also maintained that the masses would choose what was cool if they were exposed to it. I’m glad the Pulp Fiction soundtrack helped my argument. I think lack of exposure,knowledge and making $ as the prime priority is the problem. Cool boots for all if I were in charge of the world. Laura
I really meant the three-legged dog entry of which you speak —
http://toddseavey.com/2009/06/20/three-legged-dog-night/
– as a celebration of advancement in pet care and lamentation of owners who don’t keep their dogs away from cars, not innocent owners of pets beset by cancer.
In any case, we can all agree that three-legged dogs are currently not as great a source of contention as this five-legged dog from North Carolina (whence hails my parents’ _second_ seizure-prone old dog, Jaycie, as it happens), who was recently rescued from a Coney Island freakshow, to the chagrin of the freakshow owner and perhaps the dog as well, since, happy as he appears in photos from North Carolina, his New York career has been cut terribly short (lesson: one should never flee to North Carolina after getting a taste of life in New York media):
http://www.thesunnews.com/564/story/992879.html
[...] Another hip lady on my radar this week is Laura Lovelace, who played the waitress in the opening scene of Pulp Fiction and, more important, picked the soundtrack music for that highly influential film. She’s apparently posted a couple comments below a recent blog entry of mine, in effect rewarding me for getting her name wrong. I don’t deserve the resultant increased hipness points of my blog but will accept them nonetheless. [...]
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