Push the buttons, Frank.

October 11, 2012 10:13 AM

Don't Look at This! TV's Frank has a YouTube channel! And a hilarious twitter account! (Don't miss his live tweets of the debates.) And a brand new, star-studded, satirical, musical podcast spectacular: The Wonderful Pundits of Oz!
Actually, it's Frank Conniff, mild-mannered stand-up comic and veteran TV writer (MST3K, Invader Zim). And he'd like you to know that Governor Chris Christie is a large man.

Also: Trump is a chump, Meet the Press is meatless, and cats are adorable!
And be sure to watch his scathing take-downs of "Girls", Wes Anderson, and Siri.

posted by Atom Eyes (11 comments total)

Did you know that the women who don't get paid to write blog posts for Huffington Post only get 73% of what the men who don't get paid to write blog posts for Huffington Post don't get?

TV's Frank. Hasn't aged a day and has still got it.

Big Bird should remind Romney that blacks were on Sesame Street 9 years before they were allowed into the Mormon Church.

*boggle*
posted by DU at 10:20 AM on October 11, 2012 [10 favorites]

Thanks! I'll be following his twitter feed tonight.
posted by gurple at 10:30 AM on October 11, 2012

"And he'd like you to know that Governor Chris Christie is a large man."

Jesus that 'poem' is disgusting. The man is a fucking politician, and a conservative republican at that, are there really so few things we don't like about him that jokes about how he sits AROUND the house rise to the top?
posted by Blasdelb at 10:35 AM on October 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

A YouTube channel called FRANK?!?
posted by Strange Interlude at 10:39 AM on October 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

I'm going to have to give this a MEH, because I just don't like seeing any of my MST3k folks without the REST of the MST3k folks.

I know that the love of MST3k is deep in the Blue (maybe even deeper than 13). Can't we just take up a bunch of money and pay these guys to start doing MST3k again?

Cinematic Titanic is okay.
Riff Trax is okay.

But MST3k was Awesome.

They really need to get the band back together.
Perhaps the thousands of MetaFilter dollars can be the salve that soothes their red, throbbing animosity toward each other and lubricates the wheels of creativity that would get those 'bots back on the small screen.

./` To dreeeeeeeam, the impossible dreeeeeeeeeam..
posted by THAT William Mize at 11:03 AM on October 11, 2012

I love Frank Conniff. Been following him for months. He's silly funny, and when it's political, he's sharp and bitey. Which I love.
posted by grubi at 11:11 AM on October 11, 2012

I'm turning my crank to Frank.

They really need to get the band back together.

But that band was never really together, at least not onscreen. Mike's tenure as host didn't overlap with Josh Weinstein at all, and with Trace Beaulieu for only a season and a half. I'd rather have two awesome groups producing twice the awesomeness.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 11:30 AM on October 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

I've toyed with making a good ol' Frank post before, but I've put a lot of MST3K stuff up here in the past. I'm glad someone else did.

Frank Conniff also performs as Moodsy the Clinically Depressed Owl in the Cartoon Dump stage show, which unfortunately doesn't have too much to see on the internet, although they have uploaded some YouTube videos. He showed up a couple of times on Keith Olberman's show, and I think there's some new project he's working on for Al Gore's channel.

I don't think the MST guys have that much outright animosity towards each other, but they do have separate projects that are, to some degree, in competition. I think Jim Mallon is the major person of contention (notice he's the sole major Brain who isn't part of either RiffTrax or Cinematic Titanic), and it's understandable that Joel felt he was being forced out of the decision-making process when he geared up for the movie. But people are complex, business sucks, and there aren't many groups of performers as large as the old Brains who have had less arguments and splitups than they have.

I have a personal TV's Frank story, by the way. A few years ago at DragonCon I was wandering back towards the MARTA station around 11 PM or so through the closing food court of adjoining Peachtree Mall and was simultaneously talking with a fellow MSTie on a cellphone when I ran into Frank, himself, just sitting there! Like I rolled 00 on the DragonCon Random Encounter Table! I don't know what he was doing there alone by himself, in the closing mall, and I nearly did a double-take when I saw him. I have never seen any other DC celebrity in that mall at any time, or indeed any celebrity outside of their appointed panels, signings, presentations or whatever. (Convention guests usually travel using hotel staff passages, I think.) He was gracious and consented to say hello to my friend on the phone, who couldn't make it to the 'con that year.

The whole thing had a kind of air of unreality about it. I kind of felt a little bad for bothering him, and I don't know what was going through his mind or why he was there in the mall alone. Despite having gone for Dragon several years running now this is really my only celebrity story.

But that band was never really together, at least not onscreen.

But that "at least not onscreen" bit conceals a lot of history. Mike was with the show throughout its Comedy Central run, he was Head Writer, and he did lots of bit parts up to Joel's departure too. And although Kevin Murphy played Servo only from the second season on, he was with the guys behind the scenes since the beginning at KTMA.
posted by JHarris at 1:49 PM on October 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

their red, throbbing animosity toward each other

There's none of that, unless you know something everyone else doesn't.
posted by ShutterBun at 3:53 PM on October 11, 2012

Truly, he is the Greatest Frank of All.
posted by Ranucci at 7:14 PM on October 11, 2012

Mike used to tell a story that I think sums up Frank pretty well. Mike was out in L.A. for some reason, and Frank happens to come walking down the street. At this point, Mike hadn't seen Frank in a couple of years.

When Frank sees Mike, he just very calmly, phlegmatically says, "Oh, hi Mike."
posted by Chrysostom at 9:00 PM on October 11, 2012 [2 favorites]