Animal House

I am writing in reference to a statement by Randy Harvey in the Dec. 30 Book Review, to wit: The film "Animal House" was inspired by an Aaron Latham article in Esquire. As producer of "Animal House" and founder and former editor-in-chief of The National Lampoon, I feel that I'm qualified to set the record straight. The film was based on short stories by Chris Miller in the Lampoon; those stories were, in turn, based on Miller's experiences in frat life at Dartmouth in the early 1960s.

Is it possible that frat boys could be so vile and disgusting, so drunk and disorderly, so utterly contemptuous of civility and good taste -- so egregiously out of control -- that their fraternity big brothers would shut down their frat house? For the rowdy lads at Miami University's Sigma Chi International chapter, thumbing their noses at society has finally had consequences. They got the ax this week from the fraternity's national executive committee, which ordered the Miami chapter shut down.

The following is a blog documenting two Los Angeles Times editors' attempts to lose weight. It all began on Jan. 10 . Eat anything you want and lose weight? Although it sounds like something you might hear on a cheesy infomercial at 3 a.m., it is possible. But, like anything, it's all about the moderation. My friend John e-mailed me last week attesting to his weight loss of 24 lbs. so far this year with a weekly pig-fest included. He writes: "The key to my success doesn't lie in the austere diet or draconian exercise regimen.

Whether or not you've ever pledged a fraternity, the process of ritual humiliation known as hazing may seem brutal and unbearable. The new movie "Brotherhood," the debut feature of Will Canon, seems happy to confirm those sentiments. Canon's film takes place in one long, no good, very bad night at a fraternity house at an unnamed college somewhere in the South. Jon Foster (brother of actor Ben Foster) stars as a fraternity brother who is forcing each pledge to rob a convenience store as part of his initiation.

Is it possible that frat boys could be so vile and disgusting, so drunk and disorderly, so utterly contemptuous of civility and good taste -- so egregiously out of control -- that their fraternity big brothers would shut down their frat house? For the rowdy lads at Miami University's Sigma Chi International chapter, thumbing their noses at society has finally had consequences. They got the ax this week from the fraternity's national executive committee, which ordered the Miami chapter shut down.

James Verini is right ("The First Party Animals," June 19). As one who lived in and loved being in a fraternity house in college and experienced in small part some of the essence of the movie, "Animal House" is a classic. It was "roll on the floor" funny. It touched a chord of mischief and anarchic mayhem that lurks in the best of us. In fact, if humor is that which separates us from the beasts, it should have been called "Human House." Michael S. Klein Los Angeles Burbank

Forrest Kline, the frontman of Huntington Beach's Hellogoodbye, dedicated one of the songs in his band's hourlong set Friday at the Wiltern to anyone in a fraternity. Given that Hellogoodbye is an emo band (an exceedingly popular one, with a single on Top-40 radio), and emo was invented by the type of arty outsiders likelier to get beat up by frat guys than to pound beers with them, surely Kline was joking. Except maybe he wasn't.

When we were young and still full of promise, my brother and I lobbied the parental units long and hard for a doghouse. A legitimate request--we did indeed have the requisite dog, two in fact. But the 'rentals, impervious to sulkings, sobbings and other alliterative methods of manipulation, demurred on the grounds that they, the dogs that is, were perfectly happy with the house they already had--the 3 bdr, 2 bath, stone frpl. w/porch that our pets graciously let us share.

These days, American cinema seems to have lost even the ability to evoke nostalgia for other, perhaps better, times. Such is the conclusion you might draw when watching the Collector's Edition of "National Lampoon's Animal House," released on DVD by Universal.

The Princeton Review's 2004 college guide ranks Caltech No. 1 in this category: "Students Never Stop Studying." "It doesn't matter that we've got no women," grumbled one Tech male. "I'm never in bed anyway." The inhabitants do find time for humor, though. The Princeton publication says the well-known male-female imbalance inspired one prank that had Caltekkies "sneaking a girl into a group of high school students and parents visiting Caltech, then 'kidnapping' the girl and yelling, 'We got one!

The following is a blog documenting two Los Angeles Times editors' attempts to lose weight. It all began on Jan. 10 . Eat anything you want and lose weight? Although it sounds like something you might hear on a cheesy infomercial at 3 a.m., it is possible. But, like anything, it's all about the moderation. My friend John e-mailed me last week attesting to his weight loss of 24 lbs. so far this year with a weekly pig-fest included. He writes: "The key to my success doesn't lie in the austere diet or draconian exercise regimen.

"Glory Daze," which premieres Tuesday on TBS, is a nostalgia piece set in an Indiana university in the year 1986, although it is less about life as it was lived in 1986 than it is about the movies that might have helped form a person going to college then. Chief among them would be "Animal House," but early Bill Murray or anything branded "National Lampoon" or concerning teenage boys eager to lose their virginity would also count. That is nothing its creators ? Walt Becker, the director, indeed, of the 2002 college comedy "National Lampoon's Van Wilder," and Mike LeSieur, who wrote "You, Me and Dupree" ?

FAMILY Halloween Harvest Festival: Pierce College welcomes back Spookley the Square Pumpkin and his hay-stuffed handler Jack the Scarecrow in the pair's live stage show at the college's Woodland Hills campus, gussied up in its autumnal finest for the annual Halloween Harvest Festival. Scaredy-cats and fear junkies alike should be advised that, after dark, the festival becomes the FrightFair Scream Park, a souped-up, more terrifying version of itself. Pierce College. 20800 Victory Blvd.

If Dean Wormer of "Animal House" were a Los Angeles hockey fan he would have said, "Every Halloween the trees are filled with underwear. Every spring, the toilets explode. Every April, the hapless Kings rebuild." Mike Kichaven Sherman Oaks

Forrest Kline, the frontman of Huntington Beach's Hellogoodbye, dedicated one of the songs in his band's hourlong set Friday at the Wiltern to anyone in a fraternity. Given that Hellogoodbye is an emo band (an exceedingly popular one, with a single on Top-40 radio), and emo was invented by the type of arty outsiders likelier to get beat up by frat guys than to pound beers with them, surely Kline was joking. Except maybe he wasn't.

Attracting the best and brightest is a top priority for any major university, but UC Santa Barbara recruiters face a stacked deck: astronomical housing prices that sticker-shock the brightest luminaries. "Many of our faculty can't afford housing, and when faculty leave, the No. 1 reason is lack of affordable housing," said Donna Carpenter, vice chancellor of administrative services.

Fraternity high jinks may be fading at UCLA, but the campus is still the scene of a different kind of wildlife. This animal house involves two fluffy little great horned owls that have moved into a nest on a ledge at the old Anderson Graduate School of Management building, which is being vacated this week as the business types move to new quarters. Unlike many human first-year students, these fledglings are kept under close watch by their parents.

Fans of the classic comedy "Animal House" broke out their robes at a town-sponsored toga party to mark the 25th anniversary of the movie filmed partly in Cottage Grove. An "Animal House" parade crawled up Main Street, a small-town thoroughfare that still looks the same as it did in the wild fraternity comedy. Thousands lined the street in the town of about 8,000, chanting, "Toga! Toga!"

TO understand the brash, blitzkrieg humor of "Monster House," the new comic horror film that opens Friday, it's helpful to know that Gil Kenan, the film's 29-year-old first-time director, came to America from Israel at age 7, already half aware that pop culture is the great equalizer. Having arrived in Reseda fresh from the suburbs of Tel Aviv, Kenan knew that as the immigrant kid with a thick accent, he needed to hit the ground running in his new world.

WITH THE MESSY FIRING of Los Angeles Animal Services general manager Guerdon H. Stuckey, the extremist protesters who mounted a demoralizing battle against him got their way, and more. They got an Animal Services Department that will be further weakened and divided by revolving-door leadership. They also stained Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.