Talented character actor Stephen Root may be finished with his role as Milton from Office Space, but the most iconic office supply in cinema history is not finished with him.

I’ve already written about the storied past of the Red Swingline Stapler (see Jam Resistance). Apparently the story isn’t over, because here it is resting on a desk in the background of a scene from FX’s Justified.

Yeah, I’ve got the eagle eye.  Looks like Judge Michael “The Hammer” Reardon and Milton Waddams both have impeccable taste in office decor.

Lately it seems like a lot of things from the fifties are making a comeback, like fedoras, the Red Scare, and mainstream racism. One thing that hasn’t resurfaced from that period, however, is zaniness. For those of you who aren’t REALLY OLD, zaniness sounded something like this:

Olde Frothingslosh commercial from KDKA Radio

Olde Frothingslosh, the Pale Ale for the Pale Stale Male was a long-running joke from Pittsburgh radio jockey Regis Cordic about a beer brand “so light, the foam’s on the bottom”. One of the selling points was that it was “brewed from hippity-hops on the banks of the Upper Crudney in Lower Slobbovia.”

I DOUBLE DOG DARE YOU to try to out-zany that.

Anyway, the gag ads ran for years. In 1955, Olde Frothingslosh was defictionalized by the Pittsburgh Brewing Company. They began issuing new cans and bottles every Christmas season filled with their flagship brew, Iron City Beer. Each year’s release featured a new zany label, and many of them even had zany limmericks, such as:

Our Founder, Sir Rege Frothingslosh
Used to bathe in the vats when he’d wash!
“It’s more comfy,” he said,
“Than a fine featherbed,
“Cause the foam’s on the bottom, by gosh!”

The most popular labels amongst collectors are those featuring the winner of the Frothingslosh Beauty Contest (not a real thing), “Miss Olde Frothingslosh” (not a real title), Fatima Yechburgh (a local woman of considerable heft named Marsha Phillips).

The brand remained a Pittsburgh in-joke until 1982 – many years after Cordic left the station. It’s been revived periodically over the years, but seems to be out of production right now. If anyone in the Pittsburgh area knows were to buy a bottle, hook us up!

Remember when a radio DJ was more than just a douchebag who paid porn stars to fart into a microphone? Yeah, me neither.

Links:
Loving obituary of Marsha Phillips, aka Fatima Yechburgh, written by her newphew
A Flicker set featuring some Olde Frothingslosh lables

May you get what you want. I’m pretty sure that’s how the old curse goes. After the release of Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, millions of kids wanted something that didn’t exist – Talkboy, the futuristic (tee hee) handheld cassette recorder/pitch modifier used by young Kevin to torment hotel staff and thwart murderers.

As would happen with the Red Swingline Stapler a few years later, the studio was inundated with calls and letters from people who wanted to know where they could procure their artifact from hyper-reality. In 1993, Tiger Electronics obliged, and turned what was a non-working prop into a real cassette recorder with (almost) all of the functionality of the one in the film.

Film props are often exaggerated in size so that they read more clearly on film. As a result, the Talkboy that arrived under hundreds of thousands of Christmas trees that year was an unweildy plastic mass. Still, there’s something thrilling about holding an item in your hand that you’ve seen on-screen. Kids could at least have that pleasure, even if the wicked pranks promised in the commercials never landed quite as advertised.

Sonia Reyes of the New York Daily News reported on the defictionalization shortly after Talkboys hit the shelves:

Talkboy: `Home Alone 2′  Toy Is Hot, Hot, Hot

It’s the toy sleeper of the year that makes men of boys.It’s what transformed super child star Macaulay Culkin into a grown-up man in just seconds in 20th Century Fox’s hit movie, “Home Alone 2.”It’s Talkboy, and its toy maker can’t keep up with the demand.

It was made from specifications provided by screenwriter John Hughes and the movie studio, which wanted a device that was realistic but at the cutting edge of new technology.

The allure of the toy, according to Roger Shiffman, executive vice president and co-founder of Tiger Electronics, is in the one-handed operation with a three-position switch (pause, slow speed, fast speed) that allows for recording in any combination of voice speeds, as well as its silver-gray high-tech look.

Shiffman said retailers were caught off guard by its popularity, and the toy has been sold out at many retailers. An employee at the Toys R Us store in Silverdale, Kitsap County, said that store, too, was sold out, but a new shipment was expected yesterday.

The manufacturer said it is both ecstatic and frustrated – elated by the demand but unable to meet the overwhelming consumer response. It is fielding about 300 phone calls daily from consumers nationwide, eager to find out where they can buy a Talkboy, which retails for $29.99.

Oh, and Talkboy has a Facebook page.

Seriously?

Yes, seriously.

My torrid love affair with a space western series called Firefly has kept me away from Nathon Fillion’s new(ish) ABC show, Castle. I don’t want to see Captain Mal Reynolds, the rugged individualist and lovechild of Han Solo and Jesse James, prancing around New York City cracking wise with a cute lady detective while researching his mystery novel.

However, I’m intrigued by the release of Heat Wave – a real book by the fictional author Richard Castle (Fillion’s newer, softer, more metropolitan character). This was recently brought to my attention by friends in the bookselling business who found themselves stocking it on their New York Times Best Seller List display late last year. Apparently, a sequel is due this fall.

The novel comes up in the show quite often, and the real world release stays almost entirely in character. The book’s dedication is to the aforementioned cute lady detective “KB”, and the acknowledgments include references to other fictional characters from the show (with some real world producers, writers, etc mixed in for good measure).

Here’s the author sleeve from the hardcover release:

This move followed the lead of the famous Lost Experience, keeping fans engaged during a prolonged break between seasons. It’s also not the only example of a fictional book featured in non-print media. If you have several hours to kill and a durable mouse scroll wheel, check out this epic Wikipedia listing.

Thanks to Annie and Scott from Borders Books & Music, and @gladyssantiago and @AdHack from Twitter for the collective alert. It takes a village to geek out so thoroughly.

This commercial for Tru Blood (from the HBO show of the same name) packs a fictional multiverse whammy. Not only is it hawking a defictionalized product, but a close look about five seconds in reveals that the alpha males are clinking “de-Simpsonized” Duff Beer cans!

There’s something truly artful about a fragrance laden with notes so elusive that all those who encounter it have a deeply subjective experience.  Those who’ve had the rare pleasure of taking in the aroma of Odeon’s top-shelf men’s cologne, Sex Panther, have described it as a formidable scent which stings the nostrils… in a good way. Others have tried to nail down the specific notes, but a general consensus has yet to be reached. Some of the speculations include:

• Pure gasoline
• A used diaper loaded with Indian food
• A lump of feces covered in burnt hair
• Bigfoot’s dick

Many cultures are uncomfortable with this sort of ambiguity, which may be why Sex Panther has been banned in nine countries (so far). Another reason may be that pieces of actual panther are used in the manufacturing process. Either way, Odeon is keeping a tight lid on the full ingredients list – FDA be damned.

What I love about Brian Fantana’s hidden collection of toiletries is that it’s filled with a host of made-up products like Stag, Wood Grains, and Stephanie’s Clique which are seamlessly combined with real colognes from the seventies such as Azzaro PH, Pinaud Musk, and Hai Karate. The latter was an early example of high-concept marketing. Each bottle of Hai Karate came with a martial arts booklet containing tips on defending oneself against the onslaught of sex-crazed women who would inevitably attack the wearer.

Clearly, Brian Fantana is part of that subset of the American male that is highly susceptible to this sort of campaign. One can imagine his secret fake library wall popping open today to reveal the full catalogue of Axe products.

Despite its illicit status, Sex Panther is not out of reach for the common man. The reigning King of Defictionalization, Pete Hottelet, and his company, Omni Consumer Products Corporation (yes, that’s the name of the evil company from Robocop) have pulled several products out of the dimension of fiction and made them real. No you can actually buy Sex Panther, Tru Blood, Stay Puft Marshmallows, Fight Club Soap, and Brawndo.

During pre-pro, Office Space production designer Edward T. McAvoy was faced with a challenge: How to modify Milton’s stapler to justify his deep emotional connection to it. The original script only called for a Swingline stapler. No other details were specified. Within a few days he was standing in an auto body shop with four metal staplers in his hands, explaining to the techs that he was not, in fact, joking – he actually wanted to pay to have all four staplers painted authentic auto-grade Fire Engine Red.

The result was the single most iconic office supply in cinema history.

After the release of Office Space, Swingline was inundated with requests from wholesalers, retailers, and individual fans who wanted jam-resistant crimson conjoining mechanisms of their own. It wasn’t until April 2002 (three years after the film’s release) that the company actually created the 747 Rio Red Business Stapler.

A list of the features from the Swingline catalog include:

• Exceptionally durable die-cast all metal construction.
• Performance driven mechanism with an inner rail for jam-resistance (Milton was right!) and long-term stapling integrity
• Positive locking latch ensures the confidence and control of a secure stapling position
• Staples 2 – 20 sheets of 20 lb. paper with S.F.® 4® Premium Staples

Edward T. McAvoy got a chance to witness the defictionalization of his Red Swingline before he died in 2005. If you want to catch a glimpse of him, then check out the “Satanist-following” scene in Ghost World. He’s the tall baldie who looks like Anton Levey. McAvoy was also the production designer on that film.