Hollywood has its message VERY wrong when portraying what architects and designers do in a day. starchitects:the podcast explores fact versus fiction with the professionals. How many interior designers (shoulder pads included) should work from the residential office of a sole proprietor? Would you pay for the services of an architect who signed off on a building where not only the electrical wiring is shot but the sprinklers won’t work unless you explode the water tanks on the roof (?!) using C4 (Paul Newman, I’m looking at you…)? Do you trust your developer moved the headstones AND the bodies?
A&D (architecture and design) professionals Jeff Wolinski, Vince Galea, and Roberta Pennington are joined each episode with a hand-selected “starchitect” in our amazing basement studio in Portland, Oregon and try to tear down what the entertainment industry has built up.
As James Bond once said—”I thought Christmas only came once a year.” We found a lost present inside the Starchives and we are unwrapping a magnum sized episode for you to ride all the way to work. Well, since most of us now work from home….take it to the bathroom, your bedroom, basement or even to your designated crying or snack room.
Enjoy the ins and outs of architecture using gingerbread and Tia or Tamera Mowry.
We watch A Gingerbread Romance!
Before the team met Tom (aka Better is the Enemy), before “Alive or Dead,” before all the babies and weddings, we recorded in a conference room at work. We even had different intro music. We recorded “The Money Pit” and hoped we were ready to take it to the website. The audio is pretty bouncy and we had microphones in pencil cups on wool coasters.
Speaking of “wool,” Shelly Long and pre-Oscar Tom Hanks star along side some Hollywood favorites in this 1986 comedy…. emphasis on COMEDY. Ooo boy... so much comedy. Enjoy our origins and hang tight for some newness….
Meanwhile, here’s Jeff and Joelle in lock down. (thank you, Google closed captions!)
Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion. Nathan Fillion.
…and some other people were in this insipid rom-com/ sit-com that’s like “Friends” and “How I Met Your Mother” had a third cousin once removed living in Canada no one talks about.
Sorry, Canada. I didn’t mean that. I miss you.
once upon a time, joelle and nathan fillion were related thru marriage. o, canada!
What is Brandscaping? Whatever it is we have to make sure we don’t nick the balls.
The Tower is the story of a smart office building that’s mad about Paul Reiser. This high Reiser is the latest in smart technology (beside Paul’s hair plugs) that really hates musicians (especially keyboard players).
When Die Hard meets Seinfeld that meets Robin Concord from Cheers in a sauna you have a feature film…a tv movie…a TV show…oh god we don’t know what this is!
We watched The Tower!
jeff, vince, and roberta are a part of the rhythm nation as they discuss the term “cadence” and how it relates to the profession of architecture. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1….
Oftentimes designers are asked to predict the future so a client can spend their money wisely. Unfortunately, we are not precognitive. Instead we use magic words like “FUTURE-CASTING” to sound more like Philip K Dick than an actual dick.
Special thanks to our guest, Aly Pierce, for setting the record straight.
sometimes when an outsider hears the words used by a design professional, their meaning gets muddied. is she really going to “massage” the plan? does he really get turned on by a glossy, white, metal detail by calling it “sexy?” why exactly are a&d professionals hijacking the tech darling “ux?” in our companion micro-cast, we explore some of the vocab words with past guests of the show to try to decipher: archi-speak.
thanks to matt carter for chatting about: DISRUPTION
When someone says they are “as old as dirt”, they are referring to the characters in this film. Even eons ago architects thought they were great and had all the answers. This is a time when architects didn’t wear pretentious beady glasses. Instead they named themselves Vashtar and faked their way through a project. On second thought, things haven’t changed. The problem is when a Pharaoh has fallen for a cold hearted vixen it screws up his plan for greatness and a life of swimming in his riches like Scrooge McDuck. You’ve heard the story a thousand times; well now you can see it from a thousand years ago.
We give you Land of the Pharaohs!
starchitect: Matthew Poncelow
sometimes when an outsider hears the words used by a design professional, their meaning gets muddied. is she really going to “massage” the plan? does he really get turned on by a glossy, white, metal detail by calling it “sexy?” why exactly are a&d professionals hijacking the tech darling “ux?” in our companion micro-cast, we explore some of the vocab words with past guests of the show to try to decipher: archi-speak.
thanks to kevin valk for kicking us off with: EXPERIENCE
Legendary movie star Cary Grant wants the perfect house in the country so he can get away from the crazy city life with his family. Before he knows it, Grant and his wife become amateur architects and interior designers and soon get in way over their heads and this city family can’t stop the train called his Dream House. We see the family man Grant in his prime.
In this precursor to The Money Pit meets Funny Farm, we give you a long movie title like Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House.
Guys,
I feel an explanation is in order. You may have noticed we haven’t posted an episode in a while. Whelp, we are the victims of LIFE.
Jeff and Joelle welcomed a bouncing baby boy two weeks ago after a few false starts, aka false labor. We were on Baby Watch 2018 and didn’t want to disturb their home with recording nonsense.
Vince has been traveling. Lucky duck.
Me… everyone in the Pennington house caught the flu shortly after we recorded the upcoming “Jungle Fever” episode. I firmly believe it’s karma kicking me in the butt for being so ignorant to Spike Lee’s vision of what it was like to interracially date in the 1990’s.
Did you notice the holidays also came upon us? Yoinks-s-doinks. So. Much. PAW Patrol…
Could we have recorded a few episodes in advance to fill the void? Sure… but that would be responsible and, dare i say, professional. But the very definition of professional means we are making a podcast for a living.
Ha! I cry the baby tears of laughter at this… oh, the baby tears… oh…..
Meanwhile, hang tight, favorite listener! “Jungle Fever” will fill your ears soon and you too can think to yourself, “What a bunch of fucking assholes. I’m going to go listen to ‘My Favorite Murder” or ‘Un-Happy Hour.’”
-RP
Forgotten about until just recently, when this “reality show” made a comeback in 2018. Roberta, Vince, Jeff and our guest Joelle Wolinski reminisce about the early 2000s and the design, style and trends it had to offer.
We get into three very different episodes—-One episode has the popular host Paige Davis, one doesn’t have a host at all and the other has a host that isn’t Paige Davis but one Alex McLeod who left the show to pursue…..well, we’re not sure. Anyways, these episodes take us on a journey from horrible South Carolina, to despicable Philadelphia all the way to the beautiful Pacific Northwest’s Seattle, WA….well, Everett, WA. Coffee!
Lets dig into some great interior design (decorating) and watch a show only the likes of what you would see on the Great White Way of Broadway!!!!!……Wait a second. Hold it. Paige Davis get out of here!
As Vern Yip says, “Architect’s get all the girls!”
starchitect: Joelle Wolinski
A film starring the always reliable Tom Berenger and Corbin Bernsen? No it’s not one of the Major League films….It’s Shattered! Yes, one of the many thriller/mystery films that were released in the early 90s and has been forgotten about….Well, not by Starchitects: The Podcast™!
This is a prime example of streaming causing the extinction of so many films. Is this film great? No, but it shouldn’t be forgotten! Tom Berenger plays an architect/developer whose face has been Shattered (sha oobie, shattered) by a car accident and he has to figure out why, who, what and when. All of this plus a crazy condo development on the San Francisco bay that can be developed only if the Titanic didn’t crash there…..you’ll see.
Wolfgang Petersen brought us a film that combines Goonies, Elephant Man, Mask, Red Shoe Diaries and Star Wars. Tom Berenger’s hair is second billed while Corbin Bersen’s hair was fake.
This film has laughter, joy, and loneliness and sex and sex and sex and sex. Look at us, we’re in tatters!
After a long and well deserved break—Roberta, Jeff and Vince are back for season 3 of starchitects: the podcast!
No better way to open up a new season than with a pretentious look at how a self-important and self-absorbed architect (played by sex machine Wallace Shawn) can whisk little girls off to a magical kingdom and drive their loved ones insane while convincing their protégés they are worthless without them.
It’s truly inconceivable that this passion project of Wallace Shawn was captured on a digital chip and helmed by Jonathan Demme who seemed to forget he once made films like Silence of the Lambs, Married to the Mob and Something Wild. All we have to say is…..Ragnar!
Our final episode for Season Two is 1982’s summer sleeper hit "Poltergeist." Many of the practical effects of this tale brought back terrifying childhood memories of boy-eating trees, self-opening closet doors, and a base fear of clowns.
starchitect, and “Poltergeist” virgin, Graham Taylor brings his real estate nerdery to the basement to dissect the possibility of re-developing land once housing hundreds, if not thousands, of consecrated, buried bodies… and deciphering how much money Steven was making off his real estate transactions. If the amount is as much as we projected, why does their home look like a room from a 1980's Grey Gardens?
Roberta was able to find the actual house where the movie was filmed and grab an aerial shot as well as a best guess of the basic floor plan used to create and customize the house in the late seventies.
Enjoy!
starchitect: Graham Taylor
Tract home floor plan. The "Poltergeist House" was probably customized off this inital plan but the basic element are there, though no indication where the portal to the other-side resides and if you can relocate it to a more user friendly area like the family room....
the house where the movie was filmed. the location is public record; the original owners still own the house as in it has never been sold.
“Housesitter” is as rom-com-y as it gets: jilted lover meets drastically, mismatched, kookie gal our protagonist is destined to love…. but are they?! Will they?! One giant bag of Chinese food and awkward boob touch later, Goldie Hawn’s Gwen is instantly engaged to Steve Martin’s Davis.
If we walked away with one life lesson from this fluffy piece of super fluff, it’s okay to lie. You’ll get the girl, the house, and the promotion. Go on now, lie. Frank Oz said it’s okay. Frank Oz, the voice of Super Grover, tells us it’s okay to lie.
starchitect: Alex Sklar
Post “Batman,” Michael Keaton tested his menacing chops as the mysterious Carter Hayes, who turns out to be a misfit, well-to-do psychopath hell bent on making his landlords’ (Melanie Griffith and Matthew Modine) lives a living nightmare.
Vince laments: I’d totally follow Melanie into the desert to get my sex robot back any day.
The starchitects team and guest Diony Lopez talk about the realities of being a landlord in San Francisco, something Diony, Jeff, and Vince have in common. Strangely, this movie isn’t too far off in its depiction of horrific tenants who will do anything to NOT pay rent and treat apartments like absolute garbage. Even the premise of having a monkey brother isn’t beyond fiction, as Vince shared the below picture with us….
starchitect: Diony Lopez
photographic evidence vince has monkey brothers....
Project management. It’s a job definition most people, even those in the profession, can’t quite put their finger on. In her recent shift to project management, Roberta was able to offer some insight as to what Matthew Perry’s character was doing on the job site in “Fools Rush In.” Still, no one in the room could grasp the whole picture of scope of service… well, maybe Matthew Perry as Chandler Bing as Alex Whitman could. Could his job responsibilities BE any more vague?
Synopsis: An episode of “Friends” minus the other five. Selma Hayek is hot.
For the record: Project Managers plan, budget, oversee and document all aspects of a project. Project managers work closely with clients to make sure the scope and direction of each project is on schedule, within the planned budget and executed properly per outlined scope.
starchitect(s): Jeff Wolinski, Vince Galea, Roberta Pennington
Hotly debated amongst the starchitects team, "Road House" has been on Roberta's mind for months after strong arming this film into Season Two. Roberta contends it's a movie about urban design as a small town bar owner wants to better his establishment, make a safer place for the townspeople to gather and unwind after a hard day of fighting off organized crime and shopping at the JC Penny's; the rest of the group considers it a ploy to get a Patrick Swayze movie into our rotation.
You decide.
starchitect: Russell Holzinger