The CultureMap Interview

Dallas guy and reality TV villain Alex Stein on being evil incarnate and Whataburger vs. In-N-Out

Highland Park High School graduate Alex Stein initially entered pop culture as the contestant everyone loves to hate on ABC’s The Glass House in 2012. Though he appeared in only a handful of episodes before being eliminated, Stein made his mark, systematically going through housemates’ flaws as he attempted to become, in his words, “the most epic villain in the history of reality TV.”

After his stint on Glass House, Stein, 26, started doing stand-up comedy in Los Angeles, where he’s lived for the past few years. But now he’s back in the world of reality TV as part of Bobby Flay’s team on Food Network’s Worst Cooks in America. The show’s fourth season premiered February 17, and episodes air on Sundays at 8 pm.

He dished with us on the inherent evils of poetry, lost eyebrows and quite possibly the most Highland Park day of meals ever.

“Burger House taught me how to eat a burger — it was my first, my last, my everything,” Stein says.

CultureMap: What’s the most villainous thing you’ve done today?

Alex Stein: Today, I woke up and wrote three poems in my diary, then I had a sugar free Red Bull and took my dogs for a walk before I went and volunteered at the animal shelter. So I guess you could say I’m really crushing it as a villain today.

CM: You claim to eat only fast food. Now that you’ve been in LA for a while, pick a winner: Whataburger or In-N-Out?

AS: This is an easy one, Whataburger will always be better than In-N-Out because In-N-Out doesn’t have breakfast taquitos or the A-1 thick and hearty burger that I eat 21 times a month.

In-N-Out is great, but Whataburger is the greatest fast food hamburger in the game right now besides Burger House on Hillcrest. Burger House taught me how to eat a burger — it was my first, my last, my everything.

CM: You’re in Dallas for the day. What are you eating?

AS: If I'm in Dallas, I am waking up and getting the miga' at Angela's Cafe on Inwood Road; I've been going since the first day she opened in 2001. Then for lunch I'm getting a lobster roll at East Hampton Sandwich Co. in Snider Plaza. Hands down, East Hampton has the best sandwiches in Dallas.

For dinner, I would go to Mi Cocina and get the sunset-style enchiladas with about three Mambo Taxis for dessert. Because I'm in Texas, it makes sense I would eat Mexican food twice.

CM: Any fires or mishaps in the kitchen viewers should look forward to in Worst Cooks?

AS: I can honestly say I started some of the biggest fires in Food Network history. I came on the show with two eyebrows and left the show with zero, so yes, the kitchen was on fire a lot.

CM: What’s up after Worst Cooks? More reality TV?

AS: I'm unable to talk about my new projects at the moment, but I can promise you one thing: that this isn't the last time I will be gracing your television sets. Keep your eyes peeled for more Alex Stein #99 in the near future.

Alex Stein claims he only eats fast food, and he's a big fan of Burger House.

Photo courtesy of Food Network

Alex Stein claims he only eats fast food, and he's a big fan of Burger House.

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Movie Review

Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma gives horror a surreal twist

Photo courtesy of MUBI

Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson in Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.

The horror genre really ramped up in the 1970s and ‘80s, bringing with it a new subgenre - the slasher - that gave audiences new visuals of gore, but also a reliance on sexism and homophobia that would come to define the era. The new film Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma wrestles with that legacy in ways that are funny, thought-provoking, and downright strange.

Kris (Hannah Einbinder) is a queer filmmaker who has been hired to reboot the moldy IP that is the Camp Miasma franchise, one that was fresh in the 1970s but which numerous shlocky sequels have rendered irrelevant. In an attempt to get to know the property better, Kris has scored a meeting with the reclusive Billy (Gillian Anderson), the star of the original film who has shunned the public eye for decades.

Turns out that Billy lives deep in the woods at Camp Rivoli, which served as the location for the first film. As Kris tries to get to know Billy and convince her to be a part of the new film, she starts to fall under Billy’s spell and the lore of the franchise as a whole. That includes believing that the movie’s villain, Little Death - a transgender person who has an air conditioning vent as a head/mask - may not just be a character created for the movies.

Written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow), the film at first feels like it’s going to go the straight-up comedy route, with comic explosions of blood, a strange fascination with candy brands, and a production design that does nothing to hide that the two main actors are on a movie set with painted backdrops. This is backed up by Kris’ phone conversations with her girlfriend, Mari (Jasmine Savoy Brown) and her agent (Sarah Sherman), as well as numerous other details.

But the film starts to go down the surreal route the longer Kris stays at the camp with Billy, especially when they sit down to watch the original Camp Miasma. An extended sequence shows a good amount of that film-within-the-film, demonstrating why Kris and Billy have a love/hate relationship with the property. For Kris, though, the lines between the film and the real world start to blur, and Schoenbrun uses a variety of out-there elements to drive the point home.

The final act of the film can barely be described as Kris goes deeper down the rabbit hole, with Schoenbrun using her film to comment on the horror genre as a whole, its treatment of women and LGBT people, the movie industry, and more. All the while the “camp” of Camp Miasma maintains a presence, with candy wrappers showing up everywhere and the tongue-in-cheek references to Little Death (the French term La petite mort, which means “the little death,” is a euphemism for orgasm).

Einbinder, an Emmy winner for Hacks, is the perfect person to inhabit her role. Her established real-life and fictional personas color everything she does in the film, with her enthusiasm and curiosity shining through. Anderson leans heavily into another reference - Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard - to create a character that is as mysterious as she is alluring. Supporting actors like Brown, Sherman, Patrick Fischler, Dylan Baker, and Eva Victor keep the movie at the right pitch all the way through.

While other films have made fun of horror movie tropes before, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma finds a wholly unique way of doing so. It’s a funny and daring trip into the psyches of two women who may be victims of their own obsessions, and of the movies that made them that way.

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Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is now playing in select theaters

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