What Valentine's Day would be complete without our beloved, entirely heterosexual adjudged Top Chef winner, Ilan Hall, appearing on Fox's Republican-but-randy morning show? That's The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, the guilty pleasure about which The New York Times television critic wrote:
He’s smarmy. She’s contrived. He leers at girls like an old stage ham. She talks about freezing her eggs and getting her breasts done. Together they’re Mike Jerrick and Juliet Huddy, Fox’s new morning pair, who use their unholy chemistry to pervert the breakfast hour on “The Morning Show With Mike and Juliet.” We owe these two a warm, warm welcome.
We know what morning shows look like on the networks accused by conservatives of liberal bias, but a morning show produced by Fox is more mysterious. Will it just be a last stop for “American Idol” rejects? Can we expect hair-care demos from Hannity and Colmes?
Surprise. In its more than three weeks on the air, “The Morning Show” has opted, above all, for creepy prurience.
And, well, Ilan's appearance did not disappoint. It was smarmy, and contrived, and creepy, and a little bit prurient. Ilan, sporting an increasingly porcupine-like "mulhawk" and apparently having ditched the multiple-wristwatch fad he blames on Suyai, appeared to teach ole Mike and Juliet how to make coq au vin. He sounded gayer than we've ever heard him before, but then our counselor here at Rainbow Springs Gayhab in the Hollywood Hills pointed out that we were spewing homophobic invective, and we felt mightily guilty for setting back our sobriety.
Fortunately, this being Fox, such unpleasant thoughts of gayness were not allowed to linger, and we were treated to a live appearance by... Ilan's girlfriend! Carolina! Yay!
Ok, that was our best Kermit the Frog impression. We have to sit down for a minute now.
And she talks! And she breathes! And wouldn't you know it, they conveniently started dating on Valentine's Day a year ago. Awwwww.
Watch for yourselves as perky blonde Juliet, relieved that no Frenchy-named, molenukewler gastrowhatchamacallit contestant took the prize, trills to Ilan, "Thank God you won! Thank God you won!"
Thrill as Ilan presents her with a gift, a framed picture of himself! Share our pain in gayhab as we struggle not to yell at the television, paraphrasing a Top Design contestant, "How can you argue with a narcissist?"! Delight in how quickly the girlfriend trope is trotted out! Wink virtuously as Carolina admits she's never had Ilan's coq, and Juliet invites her to sample it! Laugh "Rapturously," "Left Behind-edly," and no-land-for-peacefully as Ilan takes the sprinkling of kosher salt to remind the faithful base that he is Jewish, you know, like, from Israel! Shiver with naughty delight at Shriner-style ribaldry as Mike talks about chicken sucking up sauce! Sigh heteronormatively as Mike tries desperately to get Ilan married!
It's a belated valentine from us to you, possums.
In a little piece in the current issue of Time Out New York, we learn that Ilan Hall lives in the East Village, that his apartment is 300 square feet, that he owns two iPods, that he collects "mostly ’90s hip-hop albums," as in vinyl, and that he stores them vertically (or, as Miss XaXa puts it, "erect"). We also learn, as you can see from the accompanying photograph, that Ilan rolls up the cuffs on his jeans, has a penchant for pink sneakers and pink and purple album covers, and loves himself some Whitney. Finally, we learn that Ilan's father makes the turntable on which Ilan listens to music (since "[d]ance music just comes through better on vinyl"), and that he
