In contrast, the movie’s Stern is an earnest cuddle bear, a bit outrageous, perhaps, but at worst a class clown, and at best. The radio Stern-part-scripted, part-improvised-vacillates wildly between comic brilliance and sophomoric glibness, between locker room taunting and outright cruelty. That Howard Stern, the one who first caught the Federal Communication Commission’s attention by having an on-air guest play the piano with his penis (no, his selection was not the Rach 3), is hardly present in the movie. Once Stern broke out of that shell, sometime in the early days of his radio career, according to “Private Parts,” a testosterone-charged id came storming out, guided only by wit and ambition, and the warning went forth: Women and children, get away from the radio!
He’s a once-timid Jewish boy from Long Island who was driven into a shell of fantasies by a father who called him a moron and never allowed him to speak.
In Betty Thomas’ tamed yet very funny film version of “Private Parts,” the 6-foot-5, long-haired shock-jock plays himself as an overcompensating Alvy Singer, Woody Allen on growth drugs. In the meantime, Stern himself is moving to the middle of the road. While some suspended adolescent males dream of hitting the winning home run in Game 7 of the World Series, or becoming a famous rock star, or dating a contortionist, Stern seems to fantasize a crowning moment when the world will pull off the road to listen, moan and swear allegiance to the King of All Media.
That chapter is titled “My Philosophy,” and it’s no joke. The opening chapter of radio deejay Howard Stern’s best-selling autobiographical riff “Private Parts” recalls the supposedly true story of a Long Island businessman who became so aroused by an on-air interview between Stern and a lesbian that he had to pull over to the side of the expressway during rush hour and relieve himself.
0 kommentar(er)
