Anthony Bromberg
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Who is the person you would really like to be your commencement
speaker? That’s the burning question on everybody’s
mind this time of year.
It’s a great honor for whomever gets chosen to speak at
such a prestigious school as UCLA. It’s good press and they
get a chance to shape the ever malleable minds of the
just-finishing college student.
What few people know is that since the commencement speaker job
is such a popular one, some nameless higher-ups hold auditions
every year before they decide on just the right person to impress
upon the minds of the next generation. The pool of applicants was
especially rich this year.
Everyone from billionaire businessmen to world political leaders
to sports stars to some of Los Angeles’ own finest citizens.
That’s right ““ celebrities tried out to be your
friendly commencement speaker. Yes, you’re saying to yourself
it makes sense as you remember that one of the cardinal laws of
being a celebrity is a high tolerance for hearing your own voice,
and another is to have the insane desire to influence other
people.
Now since so many people wanted to talk to us about our lives,
the elimination process was a strange and often eventful one.
The first round of celebs to be kicked off the list included
Shaggy, a drunk and belligerent Enrique Iglesias, Janis Siegel, and
the strangely disappointed hyped-on-absinthe Kylie Minogue, who had
to be kicked out of the application office as she attempted to
literally dive into the commencement boards’ heads.
Next on the list of rejected potential speakers were the Brits.
David Bowie, who came with a speech that threatened to solve all of
the world’s problems, sadly was immediately removed. As he
shouted about being a good singer, the board insisted that he was
the freaky goblin guy from “Labyrinth” and would never
set foot on their campus again for fear of ruining all the stairs.
Damon Albarn, the ex-frontman of Blur, was also promptly dismissed
as the board declared no one with a unibrow and poor dental hygiene
would ever speak to their precious students (thanks for that one).
Unfortunately also rejected was Radiohead’s Thom Yorke.
Initially discounted for his small stature, after he started
spouting off about budgets and third world countries the board
shouted communist slurs at him and swore they would get him
permanently deported from our beautiful capitalist nation.
Then came the film stars, porn and otherwise. They promptly
rejected themselves as the word quickly spread that the lighting
the board was planning to use was from the sun.
There was a brief moment of elation when the board heard that
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. might come out of seclusion to give a brilliant
speech based around the works of Kilgore Trout. It turned out just
to be that annoying director of “Moulin Rouge”
pretending to make an intelligent speech though.
In the end the commencement board decided the best thing to do
would be to let each of the little schools pick someone from their
own section of the intelligentsia. Wouldn’t it have been cool
though, if Jack Nicholson had gotten to go up there and, with
sunglasses on, given everybody advice on how to date younger women
and watch Lakers games? Or, if Al Pacino could have gone up there
saying “Congratulations, Hoo”“ahhh!”