“The American Mall” airs tonight!

I’m sure I don’t have to remind you guys — after promoting the crap out of it for months now! — but my movie, “The American Mall”, finally airs tonight on MTV at 9:00PM. So, check it out!

And if for some reason you forget to Tivo it, no worries, because tomorrow, August 12th, “The American Mall” soundtrack and DVD go on sale online and in stores nationwide. I’m buying my copy at Sears of course, but I did scope out the Sunday supplements and Circuit City has the best price of the bunch. They are selling the DVD and the soundtrack as a combo for $20. Not bad!

Anyway, I gotta go “get my rock on” right now. Hope you dig the movie!

“The American Mall” premiere party @ The Cabana Club!

Located just around the corner from the Cinerama Dome, the Cabana Club on Ivar has a really cool “old Hollywood” vibe that I kinda love. There’s a little swimming pool-like water running through the place, bridges to the bar, and crazy cool cabanas everywhere you look. I swear to God, this joint is so retro, you half expect to see Louis B. Mayer boozing it up Errol Flynn in the corner.

Christine and I had been here once before, for the WGA’s post-strike “Contract Celebration Party” in March, but obviously, this party was a lot more fun. And unlike the WGA bash where the bar was only halfway “open”, on Monday night, the free drinks were flowing freely, amigos!

And though most of the food was delicious, I’d have to say the highlights were the “American Mall” cookies and the Ben & Jerry’s booth — there is a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream cart prominently featured in the movie — that came stocked with five yummy flavors of ice cream.

There was also a hugely popular Sears Arrive Lounge photo booth near the dance floor (we took two sets of pics) and an area where people could spread out and play MTV’s hit video game “Rock Band” — which is also featured kinda prominently in my movie. I know, I know…product placement much? But, hello, this movie is set in a mall…so, what better place to, um, place some products?

Ooo, speaking of branding. I know they probably do this at all the Hollywood premieres, but another thing I totally loved was the fact that they slapped “The American Mall” logo on EVERYTHING. Napkins, the food trays, cookies, a super cool neon sign over the bar, hell, even the wait staff and bartenders wore “American Mall” t-shirts. It was awesome!

But the highlight of the evening was really just chilling with the cast and crew from the movie. I had met all of the core cast members when I visited the set in Utah back in February, but Christine was meeting them all for the first time and had a blast. Everyone — and I mean everyone — both in front of and behind the camera was crazy nice! Seriously, it was like old home week…

I’m sure you’ll recognize some of the more famous guests at the party — Jai Rodriguez from “Queer Eye For The Straight Guy” told me he loved the movie as did the super cool African-American chick from “High School Musical”, Monique Coleman — but, mark my words, the rest of the “Mall” cast is gonna be huge. And they deserve it, because, in my totally unbiased opinion, they really rocked that mall hard, baby.

So with Christine’s feet ready to fall off — those heels were high, yo! — we stumbled back to our car just before midnight and hurried home to open our gift bags! Sadly, no “Rock Band”, but we did get some cool guitar string bracelets like the one the Ally character wears in the movie, “American Mall” t-shirts, stickers, a CD of the soundtrack and loads of Clean and Clear products…so, hey, not a bad way to end the night.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to rinse off my new deep-cleansing acne mask and go to bed. Que viva la Mall!

Back-to-school shopping @ “The American Mall”

With a nifty new Clean & Clear “The American Mall” premiere party sweepstakes already in the works on the movie’s official website, MTV announced plans this week for a massive promotional tie-in with Sears. Yep, you heard me…Sears!

Being a long-time Sears shopper — when we were kids, it was the only place my Dad had a credit card at, so we wore a lot of Sears brand finery in our day — I was kinda thrilled to learn that Sears stores nationwide would be pushing “Mall” hard in the next few months. I mean, hey, what better place to promote my mall movie than the place where I learned to shop. Cool, huh?

Timed to coincide with the crazy-profitable back-to-school shopping season, Reuters is describing the Sears partnership as: ”A multi-layered integrated marketing campaign built around the movie target[ing] the core MTV audience on-air, online and in stores — in time for the back-to-school shopping season.” Wow…you said it Reuters!

And let me tell ya, Sears isn’t missing a beat with this one. The Associated Press is reporting — yes, clearly I’ve been kind of over-googling lately — that Sears even has a new tagline for the back-to-school push: ‘Don’t just go back. Arrive”.

And even though they also announced a special website for the promo called the “Sears Arrive Lounge”, I was not able to load it this afternoon, so…not sure if it’s up and running yet.

And the Sears “Mall” mania doesn’t end there, folks. The venerable retail institution will also be featuring “Mall” cast members in their TV, radio, and print ads, distribute special VIP access cards to teens nationwide and even incorporate something called “Sears in-store experience zones”, which will feature “Mall” character looks as created through consultation with the movie’s costume designer, Cynthia Summers. Rock on, Cynthia!

But perhaps the coolest element of the Sears tie-in is that they’ll be releasing scads of officially-licensed “The American Mall” merchandise and a special edition of the DVD (available only at Sears!) with an entire bonus disc of exclusive material. Whew…good thing I didn’t pre-order my DVD at Amazon yet!

Anyway, I know it’s totally lame to be geeking out about all this, but, I gotta admit that I am a little excited at the prospect of shopping for clothing inspired by my characters at my local Sears. I guess the biggest thing I have to worry about now is whether or not Joey’s super cool “janitor coveralls” come in a XXL…