I like David Cross. Shut Up, You Fucking Baby! is my favorite comedy album of all time. (Not that there's a ton of competition: That Adam Sandler tape I loved back in 10th grade with Fatty McGee and Toll Booth Willie is probably at No. 2.) And I would likely lose my A.V. Club ID card if I didn't love Mr. Show and Arrested Development. I wouldn't call myself a super-fan, but I expect good things from David Cross. I mean that as a compliment. I respect the guy.
Which is why, like my colleague Kyle Ryan, I was kinda bummed to see Cross lend his considerable talents to the horrid-looking Alvin And The Chipmunks movie. I want to stress the word "kinda" here. I don't toss and turn at night if a comedian I like makes a craphole flick strictly for the money. If David Cross doesn't care how his IMDB entry looks, why should I? Either way I'll still think Three Times One Minus One is funny. That said, I was annoyed by this snide, dishonest, and largely unsuccessful attempt to deflect the "vitriol that's been flung about like so much monkey poo" about Cross' obvious rodent-related cash grab. Cross wants the world to know that "usually I wouldn't give a shit about what everyone's feelings" are on the shitty, shitty children's films he agrees to appear in just for the paychecks, but he's finally (finally!) been moved to write 1,700 words on the subject just this one time.
If you don't feel like reading Cross' lengthy defensive screed, I'll sum it up for you: "I won't apologize for making Alvin And The Chipmunks. Why? Because I haven't even seen it! It's a kids' movie, and it doesn't matter if I think it sucks. But if I did see it and thought it sucked, I wouldn't care. If you do care, you're a dope. Besides, I haven't worked in six months and I wanted to buy property in upstate New York, and credibility doesn't get you a cottage these days!" Essentially, it's one long shrug, an "integrity schmintegrity!" rant that's laced with latent self-loathing.
If the "I haven't worked in six months!" defense sounds familiar, it's because David Cross also used it to justify his sleazy role as the Howard K. Stern-esque character in the infamous Anna Nicole Smith-esque episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent last year. In an interview with Time Out Chicago Cross did to Law & Order what he does to every lousy project he signs up for: he publicly called it a piece of shit and said he did it for the money or the work. "I didn't in any way, shape or form study the character," he said. "It's obviously, on its face, insipid and not worth ten seconds of my time or anybody else's time. The fact that people got involved with it is just distressing…and a certain kind of pathetic.
"Acting can be quite literally the easiest job in the United States of America that you could possibly have. And Criminal Intent is a great example of that. I'm not knocking these guys at all, but…there's nothing to do. You memorize a page of dialogue–maybe–that's an interaction, and you come in and say all the typical stuff that's practically all exposition: 'Yeah, but he had the photos at 12:30, which means somebody else [Pause] developed them.' Even the characters have the easiest job because everyone sort of confesses."