Cable TV Shows: November 2006 Archives

For some reason, I got on the mailing list for Reason magazine. Just what I need, ANOTHER magazine. But the cover of the Dec. 2006 issue got my attention: "10 Years of South Park: Trey Parker & Matt Stone on censorship, politics, and staying funny."

The portion of the interview that I was most interested in was about the infamous "Trapped in the Closet" one that lampoons Tom Cruise and Scientology and makes thinly-veiled remarks about the actor's much-speculated-about sexuality. (Cruise is due to marry actress Katie Holmes, the mother of his daughter, Suri, this weekend ). The "South Park" episode shows Cruise's ex-wife Nicole Kidman and fellow Scientologist John Travolta attempting to coax a fictional Tom Cruise character out of a closet, with Kidman saying: "Don't you think this has gone on long enough? It's time for you to come out of the closet. You're not fooling anyone."

The episode aired once in 2005 but was pulled from the rerun schedule which caused a storm of controversy. Here is some of what Stone had to say about it:

Q: How did the network respond to pressure from the Church of Scientology about the episode?
Stone: They blew it off. To be fair, it wasn't really at the Comedy Central level. It was way up at the [Comedy Central owner] Viacom level. It wasn't a choice or anything we had any say in. The only thing that we got was a phone call saying that the producers of "Mission Impossible 3" (released by Viacom-owned Paramount Pictures) want this show off the air. The rerun was supposed to air that night. So we bitched and moaned and yelled at them on the phone...But then we realized - and luckily it came true - that you can't just pull an episode off the air anymore. People are going to find out. Sure enough, it was all over the press. The Internet makes those backroom deals a lot harder to do."

I love this ad: "Wedding Wars: His brother is out. his wedding is off. The war is on."
Hey, I don't know if this movie is any good but i intend to find out. Why? Will give ya two reasons: John Stamos and Eric Dane. The impossibly handsome Stamos, whose presence has really boosted the ratings for "ER" this season, plays a gay wedding planner whose brother (Dane, Dr. McSteamy on "Grey's Anatomy") is getting married to the conservative (anti-gay marriage) governor's daughter. That's when things get interesting. Stamos goes on strike, refusing to plan the wedding and calling for a nationwide strike on all weddings.

The movie airs on A&E channel on Monday, Dec. 11...9 p.m. (8 p.m. central)

I gotta say, I love that Cybill Shepherd! A star for 35 years starting with 1971's "Last Picture Show," Cybill always finds a way to reinvent herself. She's gone from A-list movie star to country singer to TV superstar ("Moonlighting") to Emmy-nominated sitcom lead ("Cybill) to talk show host, author and cabaret singer.
What. A. Woman.
But we haven't seen much of Cybill lately except for in a pair of TV movies in which she played Martha Stewart. But come Jan. 21, the sensational Shepherd will join the cast of Showtime's "The L Word" as a vice chancellor of a university and married mother of two children who has a fling with Leisha Hailey's character, Alice.

Shepherd, 56, tells USA Today that she "never played a character like this before. It's just thrilling to be part of a show that's almost all women."

As for the love scenes? "It's easier to play a love scene with a woman," she says. Men have more "issues."

Shepherd says more than once that she was "turned on" by the woman-woman sex scenes. But the twice-divorced Shepherd says that in real life, she has a boyfriend. Basically, she doesn't like labels. "If you look at what we know about men, women and our sexuality, a great majority of people are bisexual. So what's wrong with that?"