"It's hilarious - very acerbic and biting. It offends everybody but does what 'South Park' does best, which is by the end it comes around and has something great to say," Cheyenne told Pop Wrap.

"I play the main missionary, Elder something," he said, straining to recall the name of his character. But the biggest unknown still is who else will be joining the cast. When I asked Cheyenne which other actors would be co-starring, all he would say (through the world's largest grin) is, "a lot of people - all amazing." ...The show starts rehearsals in December, so expect to see it on the Great White Way sometime in 2009!

Finally, a way for gays to get inside Mormons that doesn't involve three Sprite Zeros and some balled-up long underwear! At Defamer HQ, we're especially excited for the original soundtrack; we've heard that even Sondheim can't top the Joseph Smith love theme, "I Do, I Do, I Do (to You, and You, and You)."

• 'South Park' Creators Take on Salt Lake in New Mormon Musical! [Popwrap]

• 'About Last Night' [South Park Studios]

On the Conservative right you have jingo-tastic torture and shoot first, then maybe ask questions 24. Alongside it are The Hills (Heidi Montag endorses McCain, he calls her "a very talented actress", John Adams twirls in his grave. Plus it's all about remorseless spending and there are no gays on the show and, actually, thousands of gays in LA, especially working in fashion for God's sake), The Sopranos (we think it's more about conservative people than it is conservative, but some people read it is rah rah family values, in perverted way. And yes we realize it's not on the air anymore, whatevs), and Two and a Half Men. OK, so we don't normally watch that show but lots of people do! We suspect they're the 60 million people we don't want to talk to, enemies of ideas and progress and rebellion against the status quo.

On the left you have Liberal nutjobs like 30 Rock (though Tina Fey's character once said she would probs end up voting for McCain, that was a while ago, and man oh man things have changed. That "Cooter" episode alone qualifies it as one of the most searingly liberal shows on the air), gay-friendly fare like Greek (best show on TV right now, no joke. Watch it.), the aforementioned GG (its actors are libs, its cast ethno and homo friendly, the really rich kids avoid talking about what would probably be conny politics), and Mad Men. This show is a toss up because, like The Sopranos it's about some conservative people, but not necessarily conservative in its messages. It's ultimately a study of the Beginning of the End of the American dream, which gives it some trenchantly liberal undertones. Plus that sad gay character. Hm. Just like Sopranos.

And then there's South Park in the middle, the cartoon show with its own brand of Libertarianism. I suppose it's fair for an iconoclast to claim no particular affiliation other than with one's own self-satisfaction.

What else would you add to the chart, and where? Maybe a conservative nod to "fuck habeas corpus" shows like Law & Order: SVU?

The guy was an innovator, a soul-butterer, a sex-machine to all the chicks, a chocolate-salty-balls-haver. And the guy never changed: Here he is performing in Chicago in 1973 (rocking a cape, gold link harness, and orange leggings), and looking as if he hadn't aged a day at the Hollywood Bowl 34 years later. The only piece of the puzzle that never seemed to fit was his devotion to Scientology, which would lead to his acrimonious departure from South Park after nine seasons voicing the beloved Chef, and at least one regrettable LP release ("The Joy of Creating - The Golden Era Musicians and Friends play L. Ron Hubbard," featuring the musical talents of fellow adherents Chick Corea and Doug E. Fresh (!)). The rule of threes suggests the grim reaper isn't yet done with his dirty work. Sam Jackson just wrapped on Soul Men, co-starring Mac and Hayes. Just keep a third eye on any hungry smart-sharks sneaking up behind you, Sam, is all we're saying.

[With thanks to Dr Ned, M.D. for the photo.]

• Isaac Hayes, 65; innovative singer, composer changed pop music with hits like 'Shaft' [LAT]
• Dr Ned, M.D. [Tumblr]

Defamer: I see you have a series called Four in Focus dedicated to first-time filmmakers. Is there one to watch? Do you find that younger filmmakers focus on different subject matter than their predecessors?

Kirsten Schaffer: Half Life, by Jennifer Phang, is exceptional (see video clip above). The thing that they have in common—which is interesting and sort of new is that the gay subject matter is definitely a part of a story, but it’s not the central focus of any of these stories.

Do you think that’s something different with the younger generation?

I do. Because this generation has grown up seeing more images of queer people on film and in television, they are free to tell stories they want to tell, and integrate the queerness in different ways. Like, in the 90s and even in the first part of 2000s, we weren’t seeing enough coming out stories, so people were making a lot more coming out stories. They are still being made and they are often good, but at the same time the filmmakers are reaching a little bit deeper into their lives and telling stories that are complicated and involve queer stories in a different way.

How has the quality and number of submissions changed over the years?

The submissions have definitely gone up. When I first started programming in Seattle with a fax machine-before the Internet, I feel like there were maybe 200 submissions. So now it’s tripled, and I think the biggest change is the diversity of things to choose from. It used to be if there was a gay romantic comedy, you had to show it. Now, there are 20 gay romantic comedies, and you can choose from the best. That said, the other thing that’s changed, more so, in the last couple of years, is that there’s fewer and fewer films being made on film and more being made on video and DVD. And the plus side of that is that people who didn’t have access to film are making great movies. The downside of that is, sometimes it feels like the movies are getting made really fast. Sometimes the quality isn’t always the same. The stories are good, they are interesting, but there’s something that’s missing from not being made on film.

Local filmmaker JD Disalvatore has a funny line on her website: "Please, help me, help you not see bad gay movies!!!" Do you think this is a frequent pitfall in some gay films?

I think it’s happening in independent cinema across the board. I don’t think it’s just gay films, I think it’s everything. It really is, it’s great and it’s terrible at the same time. There are some good movies being made, but just because somebody grabs a camera and makes a real good movie, but then, there’s a lot more to wade through because someone is grabbing a camera and making a movie. There’s a intentionality and a skill that’s missing than when you are making a film on film, and you have to spend two, three, five, 10 years raising the money and reworking the script. There’s a difference between making a movie in a month and making a movie in five years.

Which movies do you consider some of the most monumental flicks in gay filmmaking that Outfest has shown?

Hedwig and the Angry Inch—that was the opening night in 2001; Boys Don’t Cry; High Art; Making Love in 1983; Desert Heart in 1985; Paris is Burning; Poison, Todd Haynes’ film from 1991; Go Fish in 1994; Celluloid Closet in 95.

Which flicks in this year’s fest are worthy of the Canon—as they say?

There’s a film called Wild Combination about musician Arthur Russell which I think is exceptional. I think a Jihad for Love because it’s the first of its kind is a really important movie. I really like this film The World Unseen, a lesbian film set in South Africa in 50s. It’s really lovely and beautiful.

Half Life—that is set suburban northern California, it’s about a family and a single mom and her two teenage children; trying to figure life out in the suburbs. It’s not as dark as Todd Solondz’s movie, Welcome to the Dollhouse. It’s a little bit dark, sometimes funny and mostly dramatic suburban tale, which is my favorite kind of movie. A little like American Beauty, Safety of Objects. What this has that’s different is the 12, or 13 year-old boy lives in a fantasy world, and when he goes into that fantasy world, she uses animation. The teenage girl—the 19 year-old-—her best friend is gay and there’s a whole subplot that focuses on their relationship and his relationship to his Christian parents.

Hamlet 2. Andrew Fleming’s new movie, he did Threesome. This is a really fun film with Amy Poehler, Catherine Keener, Elizabeth Shue. It’s about a high school drama teacher who is quite unsuccessful and decides that instead of doing the kind of plays he’s been doing, he’s going to write his own. So he writes Hamlet 2. There’s one of the students is gay and he writes Hamlet 2 as a musical, so it’s pretty campy.

We’re also showing a film called 11 Minutes which is about Jay McCarroll, the first winner of Project Runway. I think that’s going to be a fun screening because he’s going to be there. That’s on July 16th.

What sort of movies are you ultimately looking for?

We’re looking for films that are of interest to the lesbian, gay, transgender, queer, community. It’s kind of broad. Sometimes that’s a film that’s a gay film from start to finish, or sometimes that’s a film that’s really campy, because it’s of interest to the gay community. Like this year, we’re doing South Park as a sing-a-long, because we think that’s campy and fun and the gays want to see that. Sometimes we’ll show some feminist movie that’s not that lesbian but it’s really about women and feminist culture and that’s of interest to lesbian audience. This year we’re showing a film that’s mostly about environmental issues, it’s a mockumentary, but it has a gay-appearing character as the lead, but it’s not about their gay identity at all. It’s totally about environmental issues. But they seem gay to me and I liked it, so we’re showing it. The movie is called Sizzle. It has an awesome photo of a guy and a polar bear in a slightly compromising position.

For more info: check the schedule here.

Also: FREE TIX. First two people to respond to each email get entree to the Eleven Minutes screening Wed. 7/16 at 8 p.m., and The South Park Sing-a-long on Thur. 7/17 at 8 p.m. Both are at the Ford. Send emails to southpark AT outfest DOT org and 11min AT outfest DOT org and it might just be your lucky day.

The vast majority of YouTube partners haven't talked about what they're pulling in. Neither has the company. And there's really no incentive to; revealing the pay would only make users more agitated when they're not at the top of the list. So we're not sure how much Tay Zonday or Chris Crocker are making. But I can tell you this about the Internet stars that South Park killed off:

1. Tay Zonday, "Chocolate Rain": Unknown, but possibly a good amount. Probably made more from his Dr. Pepper commercial.
2. Tron Guy: Probably nothing; he was only part of other people's videos
3. Gary Brolsma, "Numa Numa": Maybe a little from his uncomfortably bad sequel that racked up nine million views, though this was before the partner program officially launched. But the original Numa Numa, which got eleven million views, was just someone else's copy; remember that Gary was the last huge video hit before YouTube, back when everyone had to download Windows Media and Quicktime files.
4. Star Wars Kid: Nothing. Settled a lawsuit against the kids who put his video online (again pre-YouTube though copies are up at the site), and some bloggers raised money for him out of sympathy.
5. Sneezing Panda: Nothing.
6. Dramatic Prairie Dog: Nothing. Apparently taken from CollegeHumor.com, where someone took a clip from a Japanese show and added the dramatic sound. One site claims it was an animated GIF long before it became a video.
7. Chris Crocker, "Leave Britney Alone": Probably nothing; he doesn't have ads on his channel so he must not be a partner. And I haven't heard anything new about the reality show he was supposed to star in.
8. Chinese Back Street Boys: Almost certainly nothing; the clips seem to have been uploaded by someone else, and no ads appear near them.
9. Laughing Baby: Nothing. No ads. A shame too, cause this video got over 45 million views.
10. Afroninja: Nothing. The clip wasn't his.

Context is everything in these matters, however, and what may seem at first like an irresponsible invitation to the unthinkable was actually a stinging indictment of what you, the celebrity-self-destruction-as-spectator-bloodsport fan, are reaping upon the sad and empty pop star husk Spears become. (Poignantly represented by a lower jaw standing behind a recording studio microphone).

• South Park

Apparently, the guys at 24 enjoyed the episode, because they sent us one of their prop suitcase nukes couried by a PA, with an attached plaque that read "from your friends at 24" and with a thank you note saying "here's your very own snuke".

needless to say, we freaking LOVE this thing.

Further details are at the South Park production blog, where you can see more photos of Matt and Trey mentally calculating the practical logistics of squeezing a nuclear bomb up a famous woman's sex-parts. The staff's giddy enthusiasm for their shiny, potentially Valencia-eviscerating new toy is positively infectious—like children on a nuclear winter morning!—as is the thought of TV shows reaching out to one another across network lines. Still, we'd caution against phasing out Snookies baskets for suitcase nukes as the congratulatory industry gesture of choice, as all it takes is one curious assistant's finger and the question "What's THIS button do?" for Canada to finally win its chance to swoop in and fill the scorched-earth Hollywood void.

• THE BEST DAY EVER AT SOUTH PARK! [Production Blog]

There's really no winning with Christian television-watchdog groups: Write a catchy country-western ditty in which a paranoid cowboy express his fear that Jesus is involved in a little homosexual voyeurism, wind up on the wrong end of an outraged press release; try to dramatize the Creator as a Being who engages in heterosexual relations, ditto. Multichannel News reports that the Parents Television Council is protesting the season finale of The Sarah Silverman Program, angry that the lack of a la carte cable channel choices makes it all too easy for impressionable children to stumble upon blasphemous programming concerning a Jewish comedienne's post-coital rejection of "the sex-obsessed Deity." (Deadpans a Comedy Central spokesman in response: "We've never been terribly popular with the Parents Television Council.") A clip of the offending material is above; after the jump, we pass along the PTC's painstaking, blow-by-blow inventory of each sacrilegious story beat:

THE SARAH SILVERMAN PROGRAM * God and Sarah copulate. God: "You're a little monkey aren't you? Who made your monkey? Who made you?" Sarah: "You did."

*Sarah rejects God the morning after their tryst.
God: "I had a really good time. A really, really good time."
Sarah: "Thanks. Me too."
God: "Come to Heaven with me today."
Sarah: "Today?"
God: "We can see the past and the future. We can fly. And I will introduce you to Thomas Jefferson."
Sarah: "Oh, awesome. I told my friend Natalie I would help her move, though."
God: "I could stop time."
Sarah: "That is so sweet. Oh your pants are over there. I mean not like I'm asking you to leave. I just mean if you can't see it from this angle of still being in my bed."
God: "Right. I should go."
Sarah: "Okay. Um. Alright. I guess I'll see you around sometime."
God: "Do you mean it? Or are you just saying that?"

*Sarah seeks help from God.
Sarah: "I learned that people in wheelchairs are allowed to have marathons, which to me seems like cheating, but what are you going to say? And I learned that You exist, and that You're black. And I think that's amazing. I mean I'm not one of those people that are like 'Oh, God is black, is he going to steal the moon or something?' And finally I learned that giving is its own reward. Which is really kinda like saying there's no reward for giving. Unless you're really into the process of giving, and that's a reward to you. But how many people, I don't know. Can you meet me half way? You're kinda breaking my balls."
God: "Alright. Just one more time Sarah."

Lest you uncharitably suspect that at least part of the reason for the PTC's outrage is rooted in the fact that Silverman's God is black, they've covered that particular base by pairing the Sarah Silverman protest with one about the use of the n-bomb on a recent South Park episode, a move which sets up the Council as the nation's leading colorblind crusader against the morality-eroding practice of the forced bundling of heathen-programmed cable channels.

• PTC Not Laughing at Comedy's Silverman [Multichannel.com]
• The Worst Cable Content of the Week [ParentsTV.org]
• Sarah Silverman Program [ComedyCentral.com]

• A Vision Into Trey & Matt's Possible Fate Without Entertainment Attorneys [SorryIGotDrunk.com]
• Barnes, Morris, Klein, Mark, Yorn, Barnes & Levine 10th Anniversary [Variety]

"SOUTH Park" creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker say their bizarre decision to dress in drag and sashay down the red carpet at the 2000 Oscars was made easy - thanks to LSD. "We took acid and tripped," Stone tells the November issue of FHM. "It seemed like the right day - drop acid and get on the red carpet in a dress." But lest anybody think he's a druggie, Stone adds, "I haven't taken acid since then."

No, we imagine he didn't, especially after having to describe his Gwyneth Paltrow-inspired, cotton-candy-hued gown to the ever fashion-inquisitive Joan Rivers, whose glistening death mask of a face is enough to induce bad tripping in even the most sober of individuals. Still, the typically tedious proceedings were undoubtedly rendered that much more lively with the added chemical enhancements, particularly when the two collaborators fearfully clutched at each other during a shared hallucination in which Angelina Jolie appeared to be eating her brother's face.

• ACIDIC FASHION [NY Post]

"South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone know how to punk the press. Media outlets all over the world picked up on the mischief-makers' recent claim at a U.K. press conference that Saddam Hussein's jailers had told the pair that the dictator had been forced to watch a "South Park" episode depicting him as Satan's gay lover. "It was a joke," Stone told us at a party celebrating the series' 10th season. Asked if Amnesty International might pursue them, Stone said, "Bring it on! We wish they would."

The embarrassing affair should serve as a lesson to an increasingly scoop-hungry and gullible news media operating under the impression that their efforts have no direct effect on global events: Their irresponsible reports not only misled the public, but also inspired the CIA, always on the lookout for new interrogation methods, to subject suspected terrorist detainess in secret Eastern European prisons to the very real "alternative" torture technique of round-the-clock screenings of Mind of Mencia.

• Side Dish [NY Daily News]

South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone yesterday revealed Saddam is made to watch the movie "repeatedly" by the US Marines guarding him.

Speaking at Edinburgh TV Festival, Matt said: "I have it on pretty good information from the Marines on detail in Iraq that they showed him the movie.

"That's really adding insult to injury. I bet that made him really happy."

If these tales—of a Clockwork Orange-type scenario in which the former dictator is harnessed to an eyelid-retractor, and forced to absorb over and over his inexcusably abusive behavior towards his emotionally needy screen lover, the Prince of Darkness—are true, the Marines might want to rethink their torture technique. It could end up backfiring on them, when Hussein manages to sway the court away from the death penalty after hearing his moving testimony about having searched his heart for what Brian Boitano would do were he in the same situation, then concluding by attributing his genocidal behavior to Canadian influences.

• Saddam's cartoon torture [The Sun]

Beating even the impressive headlines-to-episode turnaround times of Matt Stone and Trey Parker themselves, a Defamer reader drafted this cast photo of the inevitable South Park episode skewering Survivor: Cook Island and its almost-too-ridiculous -to-be-parodied race vs. race premise. We look forward to the requisite scene in which Cartman sensitively explains to Kyle why he can't play along at home, because "there's no bleeping Jew Tribe, Jew," though we can't help but feel this would have been the perfect opportunity for the recently departed Chef to preach in the final moments how it's time we all looked past something as surface as skin color, unless it's a shade of delicious mocha-chocolate covering the large expanse of a plus-plus-sized hooker's ass.

Viacom Conspiracy Theory: Please note that the pissing contest between Sumner and Xenu began on the same day that Paramount announced a two picture deal for the South Park guys. How's this for a scenario: Tom gets wind of the deal and calls Brad Grey telling him to cancel the Important Pictures pact or he'll leave. Brad Grey kicks it up to Freston who kicks it up to Sumner who — knowing that negotiations are going poorly and not so fondly recalling being forced to pull the Trapped in the Closet episode or else Cruise wouldn't do press for MI3 — says, "Fine, goodbye. You and your alien race will bully me no more."

Given the perfect timing, this would be a great opportunity for Stone and Parker to follow up their temporarily defeat-conceding post-Trapped press release with a full-page ad in the trades trumpeting this ultimate victory over their freshly vanquished nemesis. Hopefully, they'll get around to it before Rob Schneider has a chance to appropriate the gag to offer the out-of-work Cruise a gig in his movie.

• Redstone Vs. Cruise: Redstone Responds To Team Cruise's Response! [Defamer]