D3: Ali Prosch, Megan Cotts, Brica Wilcox gearing up for 1980 Special Edition, their Feb. 11-12 event

​Ever find yourself toting around boxes of unknown childhood memories? Hey, sentimentality can be burdensome. Maybe that's why those New Year's Eve celebrations where people just chuck things into the garbage are so popular. The names of ex-boyfriends and other heartstring-ripping past-year traumas heaved into a rubbish bin, leaving you with no trace of the thing lost.

But, as artists Megan Cotts, Ali Prosch and Brica Wilcox are keen to note, "Destruction is impossible."

Why is that? Since we're all experts in thermodynamics ... oh, wait, we're not. OK, so here's the deal: Energy can't be created or destroyed, only transformed from one thing into another. Basically, it's like when you go all crazy and bust up a mirror, you're not left with nothing, you're left with a huge pile of shards of glass.

And when you're dealing with emotionally burdensome objects, something left over can be a big problem.

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The Costacos Brothers

Big Game James Worthy

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Do we still have the old jock and nerd stereotypes of yore? Swishy art nerds would never be caught on the jock side of the tracks, or vice versa, would they?

Well, with Country Club and the Mondrian's joint exhibition of the Costacos Brothers' fantastical sports lithographs from the 1980s, the jocks have invaded the art gallery.

Former Laker "Big Game James" Worthy stands Perry Mason-esque, suited up, ready to take on the courtroom; Dodger-era Kirk Gibson, decked out like a cross between "Crocodile" Dundee and Jesse Ventura, prepares to hunt pitchers like game animals; and Michael Jordan dunks the fucking moon, obviously.

For the nerdier thirty-something art folks like us, these are definitely the posters that stood watch over the kids who beat us up in middle school as they slept comfortably. But, now, nearly 30 years later, there's an undeniable sense of artistic wonderment in these seemingly unlikely objets d'art.

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Paul T. Bradley

Dr. Neil McLeod toasts Robbie Burns, kilt and all...

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One of the frustrating trials and tribulations of contemporary culture is, of course, the obligatory Facebook birthday wish. From the thought-free exchange of a computer reminding you that your fourth cousin thrice removed has again made it around the sun, to the process of cutting and pasting "Happy Birthday, bro!!!" from the previous wall post, but adding that extra exclamation for effect -- it all really takes automated well-wishing to a new low.

Thankfully, there's a birthday tradition that will undoubtedly never be so pedestrian, because, frankly, Facebook can't cut a haggis. We're speaking, obviously, about the Burns Supper, a two-centuries-old birthday bash for Scotland's favorite son and national poet, Robert Burns. And, yes, even thousands of miles from his homeland, expat Scottish Angelenos and Celtic culture vultures celebrate at least once on the week surrounding Burns' January 25 birthday.

The folks at Atwater Village's 90-year-old Tam O'Shanter restaurant and their appointed toastmaster, Dr. Neil McLeod, have been doing this event for more than three decades. On top of last night's event, Dr. McLeod will do this whole rigmarole dozens more times before Monday.

So, uh, what about that haggis?

We'll get to that in a second.

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Zach Dilgard

History Channel's Full Metal Jousting premieres on Feb. 12 at 10 p.m.

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"Why are cowboys cooler than knights?" Gary Kuchan asks himself, cradling the plastic pint of beer he's just picked up at a Honda Center concession stand. "Knights got their fair share of tail, don't get me wrong, but not like a cowboy."

Over ten thousand spectators clad in Wranglers and Stetsons like Kuchan found themselves at the Professional Bull Riders' (PBR) Anaheim Invitational last Saturday night pondering the difference, if there is one, between growing up wanting to be King Arthur and growing up wanting to be John Wayne. When the succession of scrappy men clinging to bucking bulls broke for intermission, two mounted knights in 85-pound suits of armor trotted out to demonstrate what some tout as the Next Big Thing in extreme sports: full-contact jousting.

"You wanna see two Canadians beat the living snot out of each other for your entertainment pleasure?" snarls former World Championship Jousting Association president Shane Adams, the burly, pony-tailed host of History's new reality show, Full Metal Jousting, which premieres Feb. 12. His friend Tim Tobey (aka Sir Timothy of Shrewsbury) and Tobey's 20-year-old son Aaron (aka Sir Lawrence of Essex) ease into position on their steeds, raise their 11-foot wooden lances and prepare to charge each other at 25 mph.

"Everybody wants to see someone get injured," PBR Arena crew member Seth Skurja says.

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Simone Paz

Richard Schave with wife Kim Cooper at Musso & Frank

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At Hollywood's Musso & Frank Grill, legend has it, giants of American literature -- Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, William Saroyan, Dorothy Parker, Nathanael West, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, James M. Cain, Charles Bukowski -- used to drown their sorrows, alongside the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Humphrey Bogart, Tom Mix, Sean Penn and Al Pacino.

Did that really happen?

Richard Schave plans to find out.

"The challenge is that there's a lot of misinformation, because no one's ever sat down and done the homework, and gotten the dates right, and really looked at who was there and who wasn't there," he says. "And so this is really what we do. We endeavor to create canonical time lines, canonical narratives, of what really happened."

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A fully functioning hoverboard...y'know...for the kids

​Local memorabilia-selling powerhouse, Profiles in History did another one of their epic auctions this weekend at the Paley Media Center in Beverly Hills -- and the nerds cleaned house. Again.

Compared to Debbie Reynolds' series of show-stopping auctions this year, this one was a quiet affair...there was a maximum of thirty people (including Profiles' staff) in the room at any one time...at least on Friday...and we're not sure of the internet numbers. All we know is that we wanted to be there to get our hands on something cool and maybe snag a pair of Vincent Price's shoes as an X-Mas present for the classic movie lover in their lives.

While the auction, true to its "Icons of Hollywood" name, included a wide variety of items from all ages, genres, and importance of cinema history -- including some head-scratchers (Gidget Goes to Rome title art? WTF?). There were photos, storyboards, swords, costumes, cars, a few actual space suits, two hoverboards, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Sure, there were some ruby slippers that were in that one movie...and the dress to match...but the most interesting section of the auction auction block, and the most bizarrely completist, was the Back to the Future item block.

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Liz Ohanesian

Kevin Eastman inside his Meltdown Comics studio, which features lots of goodies from Eastman's studio that will be sold by auction.

​There has been a lot of activity in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle world lately. Last summer at San Diego Comic-Con, Nickelodeon announced that a new TV series starring Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo and Donatello would be returning to the small screen. Meanwhile, IDW secured the rights to relaunch the comic book series. When they did that, last fall, they brought back an artist familiar to TMNT fans across the world -- Kevin Eastman.

Eastman co-created the series with Peter Laird inside a New Hampshire living room they called Mirage Studios twenty-eight years ago. Inspired by Dave Sim's Cerebus the Aardvark and Wendy and Richard Pini's Elfquest, they decided to self-publish the black and white comic. It was a an immediate success and, by the end of the 1980s, TMNT had become a bona fide pop culture phenomenon. But Eastman has had little to do with the franchise in the 21st century. He sold his ownership of TMNT years ago and has been busy working on cult favorite magazine Heavy Metal, which he publishes and edits, as well as other projects.

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Kevin Parry for Paley Center

The Donna Reed Show kids: Shelley Fabares (Mary Stone, left), Paul Petersen (Jeff Stone) and Patti Petersen (Trisha Stone)

​Despite later starring in three movies alongside Elvis Presley and having a #1 hit single, "Johnny Angel," Shelley Fabares, who played oldest child Mary Stone on The Donna Reed Show, was terribly afraid of singing. Last night at the Donna Reed reunion, hosted by the Paley Center, Fabares spoke of "going into a coma" when she was told she'd have to sing on the show.

Fabares chocked it up to teenage angst. "At 14, 15, 16-years-old, is there much you like about yourself?" she said. Once, when poised to film a scene in which she'd have to dance, Fabares said she went into another one of her comas, but that Donna Reed, who was a mother figure to her and many others on set, was able to calm her down. Fabares quoted Reed as saying, 'Shelley, there are three things I can't do. I can't swim, I can't dance, and I can't act.'

She said Reed went on to say she once filmed a movie in which the first three scenes she shot required her to swim, dance and sing, and that she just had to summon up some courage and do it. Fabares said Reed ended the conversation with, "Oh yeah, that movie I was talking about was It's a Wonderful Life."

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Photo by Edward Quinn.

Elizabeth Taylor

​The $50,000 to $75,000 presale estimate of Elizabeth Taylor's dressing room trailer -- used on the set of Cleopatra and set to be auctioned at Profiles in History's upcoming "Icons of Hollywood" auction of memorabilia Dec. 15-17 -- seems low to M.G. Lord, author of the new book The Accidental Feminist: How Elizabeth Taylor Raised Our Consciousness, and We Were Too Distracted By Her Beauty to Notice. Especially since it cost that much for 20th Century Fox to build it. Lord has also perused the many items from the late actress's estate set to be auctioned off at Christie's in New York starting Dec. 13, and, as if an old friend of Taylor's, can rattle off the strange and interesting stories behind them.

In a conversation over coffee with Lord (who, in full disclosure, is this writer's teacher and mentor), she led us through the Christie's catalog and shared her insights into the most intriguing items being auctioned. We learned why a movie studio that nearly went bankrupt might pony up so much cash to keep its star comfortable, how Taylor's most famous diamond ring may have been a glamorous consolation prize and why much of Taylor's wardrobe is only fit for midget drag queens.

Here are the 6 most interesting items of Taylor's up for sale next month:

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Describing Pete and Pete to non-fans and newcomers is like describing an acid trip in Pleasantville to your grandma without making drug reference, "It's like, y'know...surreal but nostalgic...but like still kinda wholesome...but warped...only tastefully so." Ok fine, Pete and Pete is The Wonder Years on mescaline...or 11 days of voluntary sleeplessness. There there grandma, you know what mescaline is, don't act so coy.

The cast and creators of the venerable kids cult classic The Adventures of Pete and Pete joined an instant-sell-out crowd Saturday night at Cinefamily for their first reunion since the show's run ended in 1996. Both Petes, Mike Maronna and Danny Tamberelli, were joined by show creators Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi, as well as writer Joe Stillman, director Katherine Dieckmann and, of course, Toby Huss as Artie...the strongest man...in the world.

The evening chronicled more of a "Wow, how did that even happen?" vibe than "We made the best thing ever, and it's a crime we're not amazingly popular." Turns out, making Pete and Pete was an amazing time, and given the particulars, a labor of love that may never ever happen again.

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