Quickie: Cheesefest
Some traditions are passed down through generations, full of meaning and cultural significance. And then there’s Cheesefest — a celebration of all things dairy and dreadful cinema, cooked up in Jeff’s living room and smothered in cheddar-flavored chaos.
We host it at Jeff’s place because my house just isn’t grate for entertaining. So, we invite a few of our closest friends (six or seven curd-loving comrades) to come over, eat an ungodly amount of cheese, and watch movies so bad they’d make a camembert curl.
The spread? Oh, it’s legen-dairy. We’re talking everything from actual fancy cheeses (the kind that smell like regret and taste like heaven) to the neon-orange crowd-pleasers: Cheesies, Doritos, Cheez-Its, and, of course, Jeff’s world-famous cheese fondue — a bubbling pot of molten gold that tastes like happiness and cardiac risk, with a pinch of salt.
But the real pièce de résistance? The movie. Each year, we pair our cheese board with a cinematic disaster so spectacularly awful it deserves its own warning label. The first year, we screened The Room, written by, directed by, and starring the enigmatic Tommy Wiseau — a man of unknown origin, indeterminate age, and endless cheddar (financially speaking). He says he’s born on the bayou in New Orleans, but with that accent and vampire energy, I suspect he's a Transylvanian real estate vampire with an Amex Black Card. The movie makes absolutely no sense, the title is unexplained, and the acting is so wooden it could be used for stilts. Naturally, it was perfect.
“I did not hit her, It’s not true! It’s bullshit! I did not hit her! I did NAHT. Oh hai, Mark.”
Year two, we cranked the dairy dial to 11 with Samurai Cop — a film that somehow made The Room look Oscar-worthy. There were acid wash jeans, swords, and plot holes you could drive a cheese truck through. It was un-brie-lievable.
“I will bring you his head and I will place it on your piano.”
We always intended for Cheesefest to become a yearly thing, but then COVID hit and melted our dreams like an overcooked raclette. We only managed two Fests before lockdown curdled our plans. But fear not — we’re cheesin' our way back this year!
The 2025 feature film? Hard Ticket to Hawaii — a gouda-awful 80s fever dream featuring blow-up dolls, killer snakes, and logic so flimsy it might as well be a cracker… or Trump, It's everything Cheesefest stands for.
“This ain’t no hula”
Will we laugh till our sides ache? Absolutely. Will our arteries whimper? Almost certainly. But it’s all worth it for a night of terrible movies and even worse snack decisions.
Ladies, take your lactase pills. Cheesefest: it’s nacho mama’s movie night.
