By Anthony Q. Casasnovas & David D. Conklin

The year was 2002. My colleague David Conklin and I were fresh out of college (and ideas) and plodding our way through the trenches of the real world. I snagged a job as a senior editor for a start-up video game magazine and with Conklin’s help, tore-down and re-built that fledgling magazine – earning some minor-yet-admirable critical praise in the process. Before we had a chance to push on with another issue, we learned that our publisher/”editor-in-chief” had snorted away the rest of his finances and high-tailed it to Vegas. True story.

In preparing for the issue that never happened, we had a chance to sit down and talk with Mr. Show’s David Cross. We conducted the interview at the “Video Game Center” web2zone and learned that Mr. Cross’ on-screen/stage persona isn’t too different from the one he performs for the press. Funny, yet disgruntled and at times prickishly sarcastic, Cross’ humor was pretty much what we expected from the scrawny, bespeckled comedian.

However, that interview was lost forever when the aforementioned publisher/”editor-in-chief” “accidentally” erased our sole recording shortly after the encounter (actually, later that day) and before we could transcribe it. All we have now are the following sorry, jaded memories…

Anthony: Hey David, remember when we interviewed David Cross back in 2002?

David: Not at all. Please bash me over the head with a blunt, heavy object so we can begin the dream sequence.

Anthony: I’ve been looking for a reason to destroy this Mego™ brand Sandra Bernhard 12” action figure. Will this dream sequence include that time we wrote a second-rate column named Popsturbation for a second-rate college newspaper?

David: I’m too tired to get meta. Just hit me already, God damn it.

Anthony: Interviewing David Cross made me realize just how insignificant we – the human race – really are.

David: Hmm? Sorry, wasn’t paying attention.

Anthony: And neither was He, as we haphazardly stumbled our way through questions regarding geo-politics and video gaming for a magazine that ended much in the same way it began: bankruptcy in the midst of puffy cocaine clouds.

David: He even took a phone call, showing us how a real Hollywood guy handles stuff. Actually, he took a few calls – turning down endorsements and stuff. Damn, his shoes were filthy

Anthony: I really believed Popsturbation was going somewhere with that interview. I’m talking big league. You really get no larger than David Cross, though David Spade follows a close second.

David: Yeah, he was important or something. I guess.

Anthony: The following is completely factual: I once saw him at a bar trying to get two drunken bridge-and-tunnel females to make out – he was successful in his endeavor. As he antagonized them, with hopes of scoring an absolutely intoxicated threesome, he had on this very un-comical and disturbing expression. Think processed cheese fetishist at the Kraft factory. This wasn’t the same David Cross we’ve come to love for his bit parts in films such as She’s The Man, Men In Black II, and the made-for-TV comedy Amelia Earhart: The Final Flight. By last call, he was drowning himself in cheap beer… alone.

David: Wow.

Anthony: Dave, I find it quite rude that you rather file down your onychogryposis over discussing the rise-and-fall of one of Hollywood’s most treasured possessions…. David Cross.

David: Hold on, phone call. (David disappears for nearly 15 minutes.) Jesus, let me tell you.

Anthony: My name isn’t Jesus – I had it legally changed after that incident with the National Elementary School Spelling Bee Champion, Japanese cutlery and flock of seagulls – not the band. However, it appears that David D. Conklin is a proud sponsor of the David Cross school of interviewing. Welcome back to the conversation, dick.

David: Listen, can we finish up already? I kind of want to leave.

Anthony: HE just wanted to leave too, you know.

David: I feel him.

Anthony: You felt him then too. Maybe that’s why he ran off so abruptly. Literally, he ran – left his laptop, wallet and everything.

David: I still have his library card.

Anthony: Yeah, but that thing had expired in ‘89.

David: So did Aerosmith.

Anthony: I forget what we asked him, exactly. But he responded with, “That is the stupidest question anyone has ever asked me.”

David: I think it had to do with his middle name.

Anthony: Dickhead?

David: He didn’t want to play along and all we got was disinterest. It certainly leaned towards a zone I’m not comfortable with.

Anthony: Maybe because you kept referring to the whole experience as Dave and Anthony’s Happy Fun Playtime Hour, Starring David “Omigawd We SO Love Mr. Show” Cross?

David: What was with that third guy asking stupid questions?

Anthony: The third guy was my understudy.

David: If you’re giving lessons in sucking, he could replace you immediately.

Anthony: Well, at the time I was cast to play David Cross in the Life and Times of David Cross made-for-TV biopic. Directed/Produced/Written and starring David “I am David Cross” Cross.

David: I’m not going to let this turn into a trashing David Cross fest. If you want to insult him, just ignore him – especially his last column in Vice Magazine, wherein he analyzes to hilarious detached hipster effect, the primary process.

Anthony: Trash David Cross? Why would I? I have a silk-screened David Cross pillow. I dry myself with a David Cross towel. My hiccups sound like the words, “David Cross.” David Cross, if you are reading this… I want to wear your skin, David Cross. Wait one hot fuckin’ second, he still writes for Vice?

David: No clue. I haven’t read it in years.

“Trash David Cross? Why would I? I have a silk-screened David Cross pillow. I dry myself with a David Cross towel. My hiccups sound like the words, “David Cross.” David Cross, if you are reading this… I want to wear your skin, David Cross.”

Anthony: Well, no one has read our column in years either. Then again, we haven’t bothered writing it. So I guess the moral of this story is…

David: Vote or die.

Anthony: A-men!

It took Anthony and David six long years to formulate this latest installment of Popsturbation. In that time, Saddam Hussein was executed, Chris Benoit murdered his family and Heathe Ledger overdosed on prescription drugs. Why couldn’t God end the lives of these obnoxious bastards too? Hopefully, it’ll be much more than six years before they press their cheeks together to squeeze out another one of those malodorous turds they call Popsturbation.

David: Why in the hell are you typing in italics now?

Anthony: It’s supposed to give off the impression that a higher power added that little footnote about us at the bottom of our article… you just ruined the desired effect.

David: <scene!>

Anthony: Aw hell, now I’ve got a case of the hiccups. davidcrossdavidcrossdavidcrossdavidcross

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 7th, 2008 at 9:42 pm and is filed under Celebrities, Popsturbation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.