WNY: it's the people

Queen City Roller Girls photo by Fritzenfrat Photography.

NONE OF THE ABOVE

Biggest Bout of Writer’s Block
Every time a new band breaks onto the scene with a killer debut album, the term “sophomore curse” gets bandied about, along with concerns about the onslaught of success dulling the group’s edginess. And although it’s been several years since car salesman Billy Fuccillo began saturating WNY with screamy, low-budget advertising, I’m going to put his last three or four campaigns under the sophomore curse umbrella. How else could you explain the difference between his very first TV spots, which included him scarfing down chicken wings, talking about his angina, and standing next to a puddle of his own urine, and the most recent ones, in which he talks at a relatively low volume about cars? Those initial spots were very successful—Fuccillo has since added Hyundai and Toyota dealerships to his Grand Island empire. And they’ve clearly lulled their star into playing it safe, busting out his biggest hit (“HUUUGE-A”) and calling it a day. Here’s hoping Billy gets out of this Razorblade Suitcase rut, and gets back to what matters: yelling about bodily functions, saying stuff like “dinky donky,” and convincing us that he’d do anything for our business.

—Joe Sweeney; photo courtesy of Fuccillo Automotive Group

Geoff Kelly photo by Jim Bush.

 Favorite Media Personality

Chris “Bulldog” Parker / WGR55
In a town where sports reign supreme, the Bulldog keeps the sports talk from getting too intense, accomplishing the difficult on-air balancing act of being a knowledgable, hardcore fan who nonetheless does more than pay lip-service to the notion that there’s more to life than sports. Listeners sense that if you sat down to have a beer with him, the conversation might just as well revolve around the merits of various Who or Wilco albums or what your kids are up to as the Bills draft picks or the Sabres swoon. And that’s what makes the sports chatter go down easy through all the seasons.

—Bruce Eaton; photo by kc kratt

Best Female Amateur Athlete

Melissa Kurzdorfer
Having recently broken the twenty-six-year-old New York State high school record for the girls’ shot-put in outdoor track and field—earning her the number two national ranking in the event—the Kent State-bound Kurzdorfer could very well be a future Olympian.

—Bruce Eaton; photo courtesy of Bill Wende / section6runs.com

Mike Andrzejewski photo by kc kratt.

Paul Jenkins photo by Jim Bush.

NONE OF THE ABOVE

Best Imitation of a Fictitious Military Officer
After an FBI raid on his Tally-Ho strip club on March 2, owner Rick Snowden professed to be surprised that a year-long investigation had uncovered unsavory (not to mention illegal) activities taking place in the club’s curtained-off “fox dens,” resulting in the club losing its liquor license. Like Captain Louis Renault in Casablanca, he was shocked—shocked! Like Sargeant Schultz in Hogan’s Heroes, he knew nothing! Which all may be true unless proven otherwise in a court of law, but one can’t quite shake the feeling that a man with five ex-wives and eight strip clubs might be a bit more streetsmart. And rather than complain that his reputation has been besmirched, Snowden ought to be thankful that he hasn’t been prosecuted for a bigger crime: claiming that the club is “the jewel of WNY” when we all know that Salvatore’s is right down the block.

—Bruce Eaton

NONE OF THE ABOVE

Best Inappropriate Movie Reference
With all that Carl Paladino has given us to focus on over the last year, it’s not surprising that a pop culture reference on his campaign materials didn’t get much ink. But the first time I saw the slogan “I’m mad as hell too, Carl!” screaming from an orange-and-black yard sign on a neighbor’s lawn, I wondered if Paladino had ever seen the movie he was quoting—the 1976 media satire supreme, Network. The film tells the story of Howard Beale, a national news anchor who completely loses it after getting fired for low ratings. First, he tells the viewing audience that he’s going to commit suicide. Then, he urges them to open their windows and yell into the night, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not gonna take this anymore!” Maybe Paladino only watched the movie up to this point, seeing Beale as the kind of maverick prophet that would have conservative voters frothing at the mouth. If he kept watching, he would have seen how the network exploited Beale’s outburst to get a ratings winner, giving him his own show with creepy religious overtones and a studio audience that chants his “mad as hell” line in unison. By the end of Network, Beale is a mentally unstable man unable to defend himself, adrift in a sea of cue cards and Nielsen ratings. Paladino has co-opted Beale’s infectious rallying cry, casting himself as a Pied Piper of righteous outrage. But in doing so, he’s associated himself with one of the most famous psychotic breakdowns of the last fifty years.

—Joe Sweeney; photo by Jim Bush