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The "The Twilight Zone" episode "Gramma" is a strange one. Based on the short story by Stephen King and written by Harlan Ellison, "Gramma" tells the story of an 11-year-old boy named Georgie (Barret Oliver from "The NeverEnding Story" and "D.A.R.Y.L.") who has been tasked with looking after his infirm grandmother while his mother (Darlanne Fluegel) goes out for the afternoon. Georgie feels he is equal to the task, even though he is notoriously terrified of Gramma. Gramma does nothing more than lay in bed all day, occasionally calling out for a cup of tea. 

While alone with Gramma, Georgie begins to recall weird details about their family, recalling that she might have had some stillborn children. We hear Georgie's inner monologue throughout the episode as he nervously ponders everything he sees. After accidentally dropping Gramma's tea, Georgie finds a crack in the floor.

Viggo Mortenson's most famous movie role, by far, is the heroic Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings films, and his son, Henry Mortenson, even appeared in two separate cameos. Throughout Peter Jackson's award-winning Lord of the Rings trilogy, Aragorn, from the race of Men, is one of Frodo's (Elijah Wood) companions who embarks on the perilous quest to destroy the One Ring in Mordor. Though lives are lost along the way, Frodo and co. are successful on their mission, and Aragorn in particular gets a happily ever after, marrying Arwen (Liv Tyler) and becoming King of Gondor.

Henry Mortensen was born on January 28, 1988, to father Viggo and mother Exene Cervenka, who is best known for singing in the California punk rock band, X. As a young boy, Henry had a few small parts in movies, playing "Homeless Child" in Floundering (1994) and Darin Hayes in Blue Tiger...

Salvation!: Have You Said Your Prayers Today?.Across five decades, artist and filmmaker Beth B has produced a dazzlingly diverse body of work, spanning cinema, television, installation art, and performance. She made her name as a pioneer of No Wave, a movement that emerged during a legendary period of subcultural creativity in New York. In the late 1970s, when B graduated from the School of Visual Arts, musicians, artists, and filmmakers were finding their place in the bankrupt city. In the vacant lots and crumbling apartments of downtown Manhattan, an outsider community emerged, a loosely affiliated group of misfits connected by their overlapping social circles, fierce creativity, and raw, anti-everything attitude. This proximity fostered an explosion of collaborative artmaking, within which B played a central role. Alongside her then partner, Scott B, she made a series of Super 8 and 16mm experiments, which they called “B Movies,” that exemplified what...

Even in their earliest days in Los Angeles’s punk scene, X had one eye on rock music’s past. Guitarist Billy Zoom’s twisted riffs made nods to Chuck Berry, while Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek produced and played organ on the band’s first four albums. On their ninth (and supposedly final) studio album, Smoke & Fiction, X looks back on their own history but fails to recapture what made them such an exhilarating fixture of L.A. punk in the first place.

X’s 1980 debut, Los Angeles, furiously tore down the illusion of the eponymous city’s glitz and glamour, with its bleak songs about bigotry, addiction, and sexual assault performed with an unsettling glee. On Smoke & Fiction, the band reflects on those days with some degree of nostalgia: “We were never just kids, we were pretty young/We did what we did just to get along,” singer-bassist John...

The iconic Los Angeles punk band X is issuing what it is calling its final album, Smoke & Fiction, and has detailed plans for a U.S. tour.

The quartet of vocalist Exene Cervenka, vocalist/bassist John Doe, guitarist Billy Zoom and drummer DJ Bonebrake said they will end following a farewell tour supporting their ninth and final album, a 10-track album which will be released on August 2 on Fat Possum Records.

The first leg of the band’s farewell tour will begin in Kansas City, Missouri on July 6, and currently is scheduled to run to October 4, with a show at the Palladium Times Square, New York.

The dates:

Jul 6: The Uptown, Kansas City Mo

Jul 7: The Waiting Room, Omaha Ne

Jul 9: Del Mar Hall, St. Louis

Jul 10: Turner Hall, Milwaukee

Jul 12: The Varsity, Minneapolis

Jul 13: Square Roots Festival, Chicago

Jul 14: Fitzgerald’s, Chicago

Jul 16: The Masonic,...

X have announced their final studio album, Smoke & Fiction, arriving August 2nd via Fat Possum Records.

The L.A. punk legends also released the video for lead single “Big Black X,” a reflection of the band’s formative years in Hollywood.

Get X Tickets Here

Exene Cervenka assumes lead vocals for much of the track, with her lyrics recalling memories and vignettes from the early days. Exene’s iconic harmonies with singer/bassist John Doe kick in during the chorus, as Billy Zoom holds down slick rockabilly riffs alongside the steady rhythms of drummer DJ Bonebrake.

“X is a great band name; also a bad idea sometimes when it gets lost in print or on the marquee,” Exene said in the press announcement for the album. “Gotta have a sense of humor. We all did in the early days. Los Angeles was a carnival of weirdness back then, with left...

A number of legendary Los Angeles punk rockers appeared on the Tuesday (May 7th) episode of the new Netflix show John Mulaney Presents Everybody’s in L.A. Members of Fear, X, Minutemen, Germs, and more were featured in an “Old Punks” focus group hosted by Fred Armisen.

The focus group included Minutemen members Mike Watt and George Hurley, Fear frontman Lee Ving, X’s Exene Cervenka and DJ Bonebreak, Germs drummer Don Bolles, Avengers leader Penelope Houston, Cramps/Gun Club guitarist Kid Congo Powers, Saccarine Trust’s Joe Baiza, the Plungers’ Trudie Arguelles-Barrett, and Johnny Ramone’s widow Linda Ramone.

The funny segment began with Armisen driving around L.A. and gathering up all the senior punks for a focus group. Once it started, Armisen asked a number of questions like, “What is the punk-est type of food?” To which Linda Ramone answered, “Pizza,” and Ving exclaimed, “Budweiser, the King of Beers!

One of the curious things about "The Twilight Zone's" enduring popularity is that Rod Serling's classic anthology series has been rebooted three separate times, and even spun off into movies, and yet the original series is still considered the gold standard. You'll hear "Star Trek" fans sing the praises of "The Original Series," sure, but you'll also find lots of them who think the franchise peaked with "The Next Generation," "Deep Space Nine," or "Enterprise." But the reboots of the "Twilight Zone" aren't nearly as well remembered or celebrated as the original series, no matter how many great filmmakers or actors appeared in them.

Take the first TV reboot, for example. That version of "The Twilight Zone" aired for three seasons between 1985 and 1989 — peak, influential pop culture years — and featured episodes directed by cinematic luminaries like Wes Craven, Joe Dante, John Milius, Curtis Harrington, Bill Duke, Martha Coolidge,...

Penelope Spheeris’s trilogy about LA’s punk and hair metal scenes is both hopeful and bleak, with revealing interviews with future stars

The Decline of Western Civilization is streaming on YouTube. For more recommendations of what to stream in Australia, click hereGet our weekend culture and lifestyle email and listen to our podcast

When Penelope Spheeris was making the first part of her landmark documentary The Decline of Western Civilization in 1979 and 1980, none of the people she was chronicling were known outside of Los Angeles’s dank punk scene. They played furious music in clubs that looked and smelled like bathrooms, and lived in squats that looked and smelled like squats. But The Decline of Western Civilization is the first and best film of what would become a loosely linked trilogy exploring different LA subcultures over three decades.

Featuring rough-ready footage shot at gigs and candid interviews with future punk stars,...

Garbage have shared the new video for “The Creeps,” a track off the band’s recently released album No Gods No Monsters.

Like the previous visuals for album tracks “Wolves” and “The Men Who Rule the World,” “The Creeps” was directed by Chilean film director, animator, and painter Javi.MiAmor. Like those videos, “The Creeps” combines footage of singer Shirley Manson with a hodgepodge of frenetic animation techniques.

“This is a record I was supposed to make,” Manson said of the album in a statement. “Lord only knows what the fans will think,...

Garbage delivered a performance of their track, “Wolves,” on Late Night With Seth Meyers Thursday, June 10th.

Set up in a room with a classic checkerboard floor and filled with red and orange lights, Garbage ran through “Wolves” with its pile-driver bassline, crashing drums, and scythe-like guitar riffs. “No one can say,” frontwoman Shirley Manson sang on the hook, “that I didn’t need you/That I didn’t want you/That I didn’t love you.”

“Wolves” appears on Garbage’s new album, No Gods No Masters, which arrives Friday,...

Garbage have released the video for their new track “Wolves,” the latest single and “pop song” off the band’s upcoming album No Gods No Masters.

“This song reminds me of my younger self when there were two sides to my personality,” Shirley Manson said of “Wolves” in a statement. “I hurt so many people in my life, both knowingly and unknowingly, I’m sure. But when you’re young and in self-survival mode, much like a baby rattlesnake, you have no idea how strong your venom is. But it has the power to kill.

Almost a decade in the making, Henry Mortensen's Skating Polly: Ugly Pop documentary is finally finished and ready for its online premiere. The movie will be screened in its entirety for the first time at the 2021 deadCenter Film Festival. Written and directed by Henry Mortensen, the film takes a deep-dive into the ugly pop band Skating Polly and its versatile members Peyton Bighorse, Kelli Mayo and Kurtis Mayo, three siblings who hail from Oklahoma and have been delivering genre-shattering music to the masses for more than ten years.

"Peyton Bighorse and Kelli Mayo are step-sisters from Oklahoma who founded their band, Skating polly at the ages of 14 and 9, respectively. They call their style of music, "Ugly Pop": infectious melodies, but with real-life blemishes still showing. This film is a documentary exploring the early years of Skating Polly. Peyton and Kelli get their first tastes of success, and try...

Alt-rock vets Garbage have released a new song, “No Gods No Masters,“ from their forthcoming album of the same name, out June 11th via Stunvolume/Infectious Music. The track also arrives with a music video directed by Scott Stuckey.

“No Gods No Monsters,” per a statement, was inspired by a trip frontwoman Shirley Manson took to Santiago, Chile, during the country’s recent protests against corruption and inequality. “The future is mine just the same,” Manson sings over pounding drums and driving guitar lines, “No master or gods to obey...

Dave and Violet Grohl, Krist Novoselic, Dave Lombardo, and Greg Kurstin appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live to perform a cover of X’s 1980 track “Nausea.” The track comes from Grohl’s new documentary What Drives Us, which premieres Friday.

The musicians performed from a recording studio, with 15-year-old Violet taking lead vocals alongside her father. The pair originally recorded the cover for the documentary’s soundtrack.

The documentary, which will stream as part of the Coda Collection on Amazon Prime on April 30th, pays tribute to the power of live performance.

Ringo Starr, Flea, Slash, the Edge, and more appear in the new trailer for Dave Grohl’s What Drives Us, out April 30th.

Directed by Grohl and produced by Foo Fighters, the trailer features Radkey and Starcrawler — two young bands currently on the road — as a bevy of notable musicians recall their early touring days. “You’ve got to get in a van if you want to make it in this business,” Starr says. Later, Slash sums it up while sitting next to his bandmate Duff McKagan: “You have...

Garbage have announced their seventh studio album No Gods No Masters, out June 11th via Stunvolume/Infectious Music. It marks their first LP since 2016’s Strange Little Birds.

On Tuesday, the band released the album’s lead single and opening track “The Men Who Rule the World,” a protest song against the injustices of capitalism, racism, sexism, and misogyny around the world. The song is accompanied by a music video made by Chilean film director, animator, and painter Javi.MiAmor.

“This is our seventh record, the significant numerology of which...

The Doors’ Robby Krieger played jazzy guitar on “All the Time in the World,” the closing track of Alphabetland, X’s first album in decades, and now the L.A. punk group is releasing another song they recorded together.

On Alphabetland, “Strange Life,” was a relatively straightforward punk rocker (and a catchy one at that), but Krieger’s contribution to the new version gives the song a little more texture, as he plays some pleasantly meandering slide-guitar licks underneath the chorus. The track is one of two B-sides that comprise X’s new outtakes comp,...

Viggo Mortensen has officially announced the soundtrack for his directorial debut Falling, which finds him collaborating with iconic guitarist Buckethead, along with a theme song from ugly pop legends Skating Polly. Called Music for Falling, the score will be available this Friday. Today, we have a special music video from Falling featuring the Skating Polly song 'A Little Late'.

Viggo Mortensen is perhaps best known for his role as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. He has been nominated for Best Actor on three separate occasions, the first time in 2008 for Eastern Promises, then in 2017 for Captain Fantastic and lastly in 2019 for his lead performance in the Oscar winning drama Green Book. He is an accomplished photographer and musician. Now, he makes his directorial debut with the emotional and impactful new drama Falling. Helping to bring this work to life on the big screen is a soundtrack that Viggo Mortensen himself put together.

There’s a genre of literature, rife with fear and dismay, that’s more steeped in sinister fate than the novels of Thomas Hardy, more flecked with cruelty than the bad-dream collages of William Burroughs. It’s so infused with a sense of life’s unfairness that merely to read it is to stalk the darkness.

I’m talking, of course, about YA fiction.

Someday, somebody will write an academic thesis — maybe it’s already been done — about why so many YA tales hinge on events of grandiose misfortune. Fatal cases of cancer, cataclysmic car accidents, or, in the case of “The Ultimate Playlist of Noise,” a sweet handsome menschy suburban teenager, Marcus Lund (Keean Johnson), who must undergo a brain operation that will leave him deaf. You could argue that the darkness of these stories is a way of respecting young audiences, a way of forcing them to confront how tough life can be.

The band X are closing out 2020 with a farewell anthem, “Goodbye Year, Goodbye,” which appeared on this past spring’s Alphabetland. “Goodbye year, goodbye,” singer Exene Cervenka and vocalist-bassist John Doe harmonize in their unique way, “Please don’t make us cry.”

The animation crew behind Tiny Concert, which recently made clips for Pearl Jam and Ozzy Osbourne, drew the band performing the song with added accouterments like a bottle of X tequila, a pesky tonearm bothering drummer DJ Bonebrake, and guitarist Billy Zoom smiling at the side of an LP.

X pay tribute to fans with the new “I Gotta Fever” video, a track off Alphabetland, their first LP in nearly 30 years.

The clip features fans’ archival photos and videos of the band over the last 40 years, including several sold-out marquee signs, ticket stubs, and sweaty crowds. “This is the way we had planned,” John Doe and Exene Cervenka sing on the chorus. “I got a fever in my hands.”

“This year has been so hard on everyone, not just musicians but fans, too,” the band said in a statement.

John Doe ventured out to the hill country outside of Austin, Texas to perform stripped-down versions of three X tracks for the latest installment of Rolling Stone’s In My Room series.

The musician filmed the set on the scenic patio of a house belonging to his friend Kevin Smith, who accompanied Doe on the upright bass. While Doe lamented the absence of his bandmates Exene Cervenka and Billy Zoom (both of whom are based in California), there was still plenty of ramshackle energy in the barebones arrangements he and Smith came up with.

In March, as the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on the music industry was just coming into focus, the online music platform Bandcamp came up with an innovative way to help artists in need: For one day, the site waived its revenue share on all sales, giving musicians more of the money made off of each record, tape, or T-shirt. Fans responded in huge numbers, spending more than $4 million that Friday. Those results were so encouraging that Bandcamp is now extending this sales holiday to the first Friday of the next three months,...

John Doe doesn’t think often about Los Angeles, the landmark punk record his band X released 40 years ago this month. He estimates he hasn’t even played the LP — which ranks on several Rolling Stone lists, including the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time and the 40 Greatest Punk Albums — in 35 years. “We play all those songs all the time live,” he says. “Recordings are great, but if you’re in the middle of it, playing songs live is better.”

But even though he hasn’t put on the vinyl in decades,...

The last time the members of X were all in a room together was Friday, March 13th, the day the White House halted international travel and many states enacted stay-at-home orders. The group had finished recording Alphabetland — its first new LP in nearly three decades, which it surprise-released last week — and singer-bassist John Doe suggested they capture the moment in the studio by filming a video for the album’s upbeat “Water & Wine.”

“In the back of my mind, I thought, ‘This song is really accessible and really fun, so...

X will celebrate the 40th anniversary of their landmark debut LP, Los Angeles, with a special show this spring in, of course, the City of Angels. The concert, which features support from Cracker, will take place at the Wiltern on April 25th.

The group will also be joining the Violent Femmes for a co-headlining tour that kicks off on May 28th. The dates focus on the Midwest and the East Coast.

The members of X reflected on their history in an in-depth Rolling Stone article in 2017. Regarding the song “Los Angeles,...

The Doors: Break On Thru – A Celebration Of Ray Manzarek Screens at Tivoli Theatre February 12th at 7pm. Ticket information can be found Here. A Facebook invite for the event can be found Here

The Doors: Break on Thru – A Celebration of Ray Manzarek is a hybrid concert and documentary capturing a 2016 performance in Los Angeles by surviving Doors members John Densmore and Robby Krieger to honor fellow Doors member Ray Manzarek on what would have been his birthday on February 12. The Doors were born when Ray Manzarek met Jim Morrison on Venice Beach in 1965. Ray became the beating heart of The Doors and the architect of their intoxicating keyboard sound. Manzarek’s evocative playing fused rock, jazz, blues, bossa nova and an array of other styles into something utterly, dazzlingly new. The setlist from the concert consists of Doors songs performed by John and Robby alongside a cast of...

X’s new video for “Delta 88 Nightmare” doesn’t feature the band itself, but the next generation: Exene Cervenka’s son Henry Mortensen (who also directed the video) and niece Carolyn Allen.

In the clip, the pair trek to Cannery Row, the famous waterfront area in Monterey, California, a fitting adventure as the video delves into the X’s rough-and-tumble memories of the late Seventies and their youth.

Mortensen and Allen’s journey is interspersed with vintage black and white footage of the area, echoing an experience Cervenka and John Doe shared in the Seventies.

Formed in Kent, Ohio during the late Seventies, Human Switchboard was one of a slew of bands who sprung up throughout the benighted American heartland in the wake of punk-rock’s initial explosion in New York and London — from the Gizmos in Indiana to the Embarrassment in Kansas to the Suicide Commandoes in Minnesota and on and on. And while they only released one full-length LP, 1981’s Who’s Landing In My Hangar, it remains an absolute classic — as this sweet vinyl reissue from Fat Possum attests. The band’s...

Steve Buscemi is not really into the viral Deepfake video of his face pasted on Jennifer Lawrence's. The actor is currently out promoting his new show on TBS titled Miracle Workers, where he plays a burnt-out version of God who is ready to end the world. Buscemi appears alongside Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe and Deadpool star Karan Soni. In a new interview, Buscemi discusses the new show along with the Jennifer Lawrence video and his work with the Beastie Boys.

Stephen Colbert presented Steve Buscemi with the viral video of his face swapped with Jennifer Lawrence while she's being interviewed at the Golden Globes. The actor had heard about the video before, but he had never seen it, and he does not like what he sees. However, after the video concluded, Buscemi did note that he's "never looked better." The video is pretty disturbing to see, which is exactly why it's gone viral.

Like father, like son!

Viggo Mortensen brought his son Henry to the Aarp Movies for Grownups Awards on Monday night, where the actor was honored for his work in the Oscar-nominated movie Green Book.

Mortensen, 60, shares Henry, 31, with his ex-wife, singer Exene Cervenka. Mortensen is now in a longterm relationship with Spanish actress Ariadna Gil and Henry is his only child.

The actor also brought his son to the Oscars in 2017, when he was nominated for his role in Captain Fantastic.

The Green Book star received the best actor award at the annual awards ceremony. Other winners at the Aarp...

A new documentary about revolutionary grunge outfit L7 will be released October 13th on DVD and video-on-demand. L7: Pretend We're Dead will also get a multi-city theatrical run starting September 1st at the Hollywood Theater in Portland, Oregon.

The film will screen throughout September in select cities such as Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, Washington D.C. and San Francisco. The last planned showing is October 5th at Nitehawk Cinema in Brooklyn.

Filmmaker Sarah Price (The Yes Men, Summercamp!) directed Pretend We're Dead, which chronicles the band's remarkable career, from...

New York -- The phrase "O' Be Joyful" is more than an album title for the country-rock duo Shovels & Rope. It's a command.

It's hard not to be swept up in the spirit watching Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent perform, switching off on guitars, harmonicas, a keyboard and makeshift drum set with tambourine attached. They've been compared to Johnny Cash and June Carter, although the vocal mix often recalls Exene Cervenka and John Doe of the punk band X.

They developed a following gradually, selling out every venue on their last tour and performing "Birmingham" on David Letterman's "Late Show." The song tells of the courtship of this Charleston, S.C.-based married couple.

"It solidified what we do for a living to our parents in a certain way," Hearst said. "Now that we're full-grown adults, our parents can relax in their easy chairs knowing that we managed...

Tags: Kiyomi McCloskeyHunter ValentineThe Real L WordSick of SarahVanity TheftIMDb

We here at AfterEllen.com have been writing about Hunter Valentine since 2007 when the band was a trio living in Toronto. I first met Kiyomi McCloskey and Laura Petracca when they came through Chicago with The Cliks and that night they were stone sober because they didn't drink on tour. Both of them had long-time girlfriends at home and they were on their best behavior.

Then last year they toured through my new city of Portland with Sick of Sarah and Vanity Theft with a new bassist, Vero and beer was definitely consumed. But they are also some of the nicest gals you could meet, a persona that doesn't translate on stage because when they have a guitar or drumstick in hand, they seriously seem like they could kick your ass.

Maybe that's what The Real L Word producers saw in them,...

DVD Playhouse—February 2012

By Allen Gardner

To Kill A Mockingbird 50th Anniversary Edition (Universal) Robert Mulligan’s film of Harper Lee’s landmark novel pits a liberal-minded lawyer (Gregory Peck) against a small Southern town’s racism when defending a black man (Brock Peters) on trumped-up rape charges. One of the 1960s’ first landmark films, a truly stirring human drama that hits all the right notes and isn’t dated a bit. Robert Duvall makes his screen debut (sans dialogue) as the enigmatic Boo Radley. DVD and Blu-ray double edition. Bonuses: Two feature-length documentaries: Fearful Symmetry and A Conversation with Gregory Peck; Featurettes; Excerpts and film clips from Gregory Peck’s Oscar acceptance speech and AFI Lifetime Achievement Award; Commentary by Mulligan and producer Alan J. Pakula; Trailer. Widescreen. Dolby and DTS 2.0 mono.

Outrage: Way Of The Yakuza (Magnolia) After a brief hiatus from his signature oeuvre of Japanese gangster flicks,...

Happy Birthday to Michael C. Hall (above), who turns 41, the faboo Heather Morris is 25, and Exene Cervenka is 56. Our thoughts go out to the family and friends of trailblazer Don Cornelius on his passing.The SXSW Fest has released the list of features to be showcased, and it includes Gayby, about a straight woman and gay man who decide to have a baby together, "the old-fashioned way."Oscar winners Colin Firth and Reese Witherspoon will star in Devil's Knot, about the wrongfully incarcerated West Memphis 3. Showtime has given early renewals to Shameless, House Of Lies and Californication.Below you can see the Very Nsfw season finale (already?) of Old Dogs & New Tricks, with guest stars Thom Bierdz and Patrick "Thrust It!" Bristow.

Kevin Bacon is coming to primetime as the star of the upcoming (still untitled) Kevin Williamson pilot, an "edge-of-the-seat thriller about a diabolical serial killer who uses technology...

X "The Unheard Music" Silver Anniversary Special Edition, available on DVD and Blu-ray, December 13, 2011 is considered the punk-rock era's "Last Waltz", assembled with Scorsese-like care, showcasing the iconic L.A. band X, who changed the face of punk music with their original style.

X, formed in 1977 was among the first wave of American punk bands, with original members, vocalist Exene Cervenka, vocalist/bassist John Doe, guitarist Billy Zoom and drummer DJ Bonebrake.

Available for the first time in HD, the Silver Anniversary Edition includes a new film transfer, 5.1 sound mix, a 25th anniversary dialogue with Doe & Cervenka, an inside look into the making of the film with Angel City Productions (circa 1983), a raw outtake of a live performance of the song "Some Other Time"; the original theatrical trailer and a replica of the original souvenir song book:

"...we see the band at its peak in this legendary film, which took five years to make.

Adele's reign at No. 1 may come to a halt next week as March 8 brings new releases from a number of potential spoilers, including Avril Lavigne's "Goodbye Lullaby," R.E.M's "Collapse Into Now" and the fifth volume of tunes from "Glee." There are other strong new releases from Lupe Fiasco, Raekwon and Exene Cervenka. Exene Cervenka, “The Excitement of Maybe” (Bloodshot): X frontwoman’s new solo album includes first single, the horn-laden (!?!?!) “Already in Love.” Not very punk, you say? We say Cervenka has earned the right to do whatever she wants. Catch her at SXSW if you can. Bruce Cockburn, “Small...

Yet another interesting tidbit about the many faceted stars we know and love is that Viggo Mortensen was once married to Los Angeles punk icon Exene Cervenka of the band X. Although she later sued him over child support, there are some nuggets online that show them together in a previous, happier time. They were also in the 1987 movie Salvation! together.

Filmmaker Modi Frank, of Modivation Films, used footage of the couple horsing around an old train yard for both a promo/music video for Cervenka's first solo album, Old Wives' Tales. You can see a very young Viggo romping with his young wife side-by-side with her ex-husband and X bassist/singer John Doe and his new wife Gigi Blair to the tune of "He's Got a She." Later, Modi used some of the same footage for the song "Whiskey for Supper" by Cervenka's later band, Original Sinners.

In the clip for Old Wives Tales,...

A truly strange cow punk flick, "Bad Day" just surfaced 24 years after it was shot by Modi Frank and Exene Cervenka of the L.A. punk band, X. It features legends like X bassist and frontman John Doe, The Flesh Eaters singer Chris D, and Grammy winner Dave Alvin, who also scored the film -- which is silent. Also featured, and this is probably the best part, are Michael Blake and Kevin Costner.

Blake would go on to win an Oscar for writing "Dances with Wolves" in 1990, which Costner directed and starred in, and also took home two Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture. But when "Bad Day" was shot in 1986, Costner was a punk who'd had his scenes deleted from "The Big Chill" and had only just appeared in Lawrence Kasdan's "Silverado." No small feat really, his role as Jake was memorable and a hero to every...

Almost 25 years after it was filmed, the Queen of L.A. Punk, X singer Exene Cervenka and music video director Modi Frank present their previously unreleased cowboy satire “Bad Day” featuring legendary X front man John Doe, Grammy Award winner Dave Alvin, Oscar-winning writer Michael Blake, and with a comedic performance by Academy Award winner, Kevin Costner.

Now available for the first time as a digital download at BadDayMovie.com, viewers will be able to “pay” whatever they choose for the download in order to view “Bad Day”. A portion of the proceeds from “Bad Day” are going to Gulf Coast aid organizations that will help both those people directly affected by this disaster and the precious wetlands of the Gulf coast area. In regards to their co-star Kevin Costner, who spent millions of dollars over the last decade to develop centrifuge clean-up machinery for just these types of oil spills,...

Before he danced with wolves, Academy Award winning actor/director Kevin Costner made a never-before-seen movie that's being released today after nearly 25 years in a vault: Bad Day, directed by the award-winning rock video director, Modi Frank, and photographed by punk rock queen, singer, poet and visual artist, Exene Cervenka, co-founder of the seminal band X. The duo are releasing the cowboy-themed short as a digital downloaded for a "you decide" amount. A portion of the proceeds will benefit Gulf charities providing aid to both people and the environment. Exene and Modi said: We are both so proud of Kevin and grateful for all he's doing to help in the Gulf. Bad Day is also a collaboration of formats-punk rock and two-reel Western silents, black and white film stock meeting the Internet at a time when digital is the format...

Usually when an actor makes a tiny short film with his buddies before he's super rich and famous, the movie either winds up a collector's item among the people who have it or somehow gets used as blackmail. But in the case of short Western "Bad Day," featuring an early performance by Kevin Costner, it's resurfacing for charity. Well, partly. As picked up by La Figa, filmmakers Modi Frank and Exene Cervenka have decided to release the black-and-white, silent short online 25 years after it was made, and a portion of the proceeds will go to charities benefiting the Gulf, inspired by Costner's efforts to build a machine that could accomplish the clean-up after the oil spill. (Read all about it here). "We are both so proud of Kevin and grateful for all he.s doing to help in the Gulf," Exene and Modi said, explaining that they had considered releasing...

The 51-year-old actor plays a father struggling to protect his son as they try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world in new movie 'The Road' and he admits he could relate to the fear of not being able to protect your offspring. The star - who has a 21-year-old son, Henry, with his ex-wife Exene Cervenka – said: “You worry about your child’s future. You’re like, ‘What if I’m away from my infant son or daughter for a few hours, do I trust someone else to take care of them?’ "Then, later in life, you're more concerned about whether you’ll be around anymore to help your children when they’re out of the nest. This movie just takes all those concerns to an extreme.” Viggo – who is best known for his role as Aragorn in Peter Jackson's 'The Lord of the Rings' film series...

Viggo Mortensen has revealed that he is a worrying dad. The Road star, who has a 21-year-old son called Henry with his ex-wife Exene Cervenka, said that he could relate to the father struggling to protect his son that he played in his most recent movie. Mortensen told Parade magazine: "You worry about your child's future. You're like, 'What if I'm (more)...

Viggo Mortensen has always been a worried father. The 51-year-old actor plays a father struggling to protect his son as they try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world in new movie 'The Road' and he admits he could relate to the fear of not being able to protect your offspring. The star - who has a 21-year-old son, Henry, with his ex-wife Exene Cervenka - said: "You worry about your child's future. You're like, 'What if I'm away from my infant son or daughter for a few hours, do I trust someone else to take care of them?' "Then, later in life, you're more concerned about whether you'll be around anymore to help your children when...

Viggo Mortensen has always been a worried father. The 51-year-old actor plays a father struggling to protect his son as they try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world in new movie 'The Road' and he admits he could relate to the fear of not being able to protect your offspring. The star - who has a 21-year-old son, Henry, with his ex-wife Exene Cervenka - said: "You worry about your child's future. You're like, 'What if I'm away from my infant son or daughter for a few hours, do I trust someone else to take care of them?' "Then, later in life, you're more concerned about whether you'll be around anymore to help your children when they're out of the...

Viggo Mortensen has always been a worried father. The 51-year-old actor plays a father struggling to protect his son as they try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world in new movie 'The Road' and he admits he could relate to the fear of not being able to protect your offspring. The star - who has a 21-year-old son, Henry, with his ex-wife Exene Cervenka - said: ''You worry about your child's future. You're like, 'What if I'm away from my infant son or daughter for a few hours, do I trust someone else to take care of them?' ''Then, later in life, ..

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When Viggo Mortensen was approached to star in The Road, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, his initial interest in the role seemed less than promising. However, despite his desperate need for a vacation, the actor accepted as not only could Viggo relate to his character’s extreme exhaustion, but the two were also linked by the bond of fatherhood.

“He’s dying of tiredness. All that keeps him going is trying to keep himself and his son alive,” he tells Parade of his character, who, along with his son, is on a quest to survive in a post-apocalyptic setting.