January 2007 Archives
Well, that could’ve gone better.
Biden - never known for keeping quiet - took potshots at his fellow Democratic Presidential contenders Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama, the last whom he called “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.�
Well, hard to say where to start on that one. Obama responded, “I didn’t take Senator Biden’s comments personally, but obviously they were historically inaccurate. African-American presidential candidates like Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Moseley Braun and Al Sharpton gave a voice to many important issues through their campaigns, and no one would call them inarticulate.�
And as luck would have it, Biden was scheduled to appear on “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart� tonight, and, of course, you know what he had to discuss.
“Well, yeah, sure – well, no, I don’t want to talk about it,� an at least seemingly good-humored Biden told Stewart. Of Clinton’s plan for Iraq, Biden said, “I think it’s a very bad idea.� Edwards’ Iraq strategy, he added, was “similarly, in my view, unworkable.�
“You’ve been practicing tact, haven’t you?� Stewart asked.
The most nettlesome and ill-advised comment, of course, was the one about Obama. Biden said, “Let me tell you something. I spoke to Barack today…�
“I bet you did,� Stewart responded.
“What I was attempting to be, but not artfully, was complimentary,� Biden explained/spun. “The word that got me in trouble was ‘clean,’ and by that, I meant fresh. He’s got new ideas, he’s the new guy on the block.�
And so what did his first day as a Presidential candidate teach him? “It reminded me, welcome back to Presidential politics,� Biden said.
Biden ran unsuccessfully to become the Democratic Presidential candidate in 1988, until that campaign was torpedoed by charges of plagiarism. His original words don’t seem to serve him so well, either.
In addition to the numerous spurious examples in which the electorate was protected from terrorists cited in the President’s State of the Union address, we can add yet another:
CNN’s report, describing the characters as “outer-space delinquents who … greet passersby with a raised middle finger,� noted that the objects – which kind of looked more like those old “Lite Brite� toys than bombs – had been up for two to three weeks in 10 cities. Nonetheless, a statement issued by Boston’s mayor declared, "The coordinated response by all departments proves the system we have in place works."
An earlier story detailed the panic that gripped the city:
“The Coast Guard has closed the Charles River to all water traffic from the Museum of Science to the locks where the river flows into Boston Harbor because of the reports of bombs on several bridges, according to Chief Petty Officer Scott Carr.
“This afternoon, investigators found a device on the BU Bridge today "similar to the Sullivan Square" package that forced the closure this morning of northbound Interstate 93, said Jennifer Mieth, spokeswoman for state fire marshal Stephen Coan, whose office oversees the State police Bomb Squad.�
Can’t wait to see how the President will spin this one in next year’s SOTU.
And yet, billboards for the upcoming Eddie Murphy vehicle “Norbit� are allowed to frighten and appall motorists unfettered.
And we quote (verbatim):
I didnt kn ow it wa sgoing to be a big deal but then again ive been very busy and id ont exactly pay attention to pop culture and id ont read tabloids and idont have a google alert i find lofe fAr easier without those things, good reviews are great biut baqd ones suck and its best to nopt read them at all, i like how Ben Kingsley hasnt readhis own press in 2w0 some years, and i aspire to that- last time i read my press was a Brit piece that had me in bed for three dayus and is wor eoff reading my own press after that, of ocuerse i needmy publicist to tell me who to speak to and who nit to but my days of speaking directly to editors etc are behind me- i was followed by paparazzi all day today and have had to get armed security for the evening so we can have some privacy die to that dumb piece wich is ourt of prder an dout of context its TOTALLY RANDOM
So, of ocuerse, Love needs a publicist to explain these things to her, such as how to tell the difference between a legitimate job offer and just some random jackass phoning up and, after asking her if she has Dr. Pepper in a can, offering her a gig on America’s biggest TV show. After all, it’s not like she’s been in showbiz for a couple of decades or anything.
Amazing how it only takes a quarter of a century for the cutting-edge to become the venerated mainstream. On Thursday, David Letterman will celebrate 25 years of late-night antics on his “Late Show� (CBS Channel 2, 11:35 p.m.)
And though Letterman may always be more fondly remembered for his truly anarchic “Late Night� show on NBC, he’s actually been on CBS for longer – 14 years.
Bill Murray, the inaugural guest on both Letterman’s NBC and CBS shows, will again serve as guest on the silver anniversary broadcast. Also appearing will be the Cleveland Cavaliers’ LeBron James – who wasn’t yet born when Letterman first took to the late-night airwaves (incredibly enough, he also had a short-lived morning show on NBC).
Letterman’s closing in on Johnny Carson, who spent 30 years tucking Americans into bed.
*
Apparently, “Heroes� and “24� can co-exist peaceably in the 9 p.m. Monday timeslot without resorting to the nuclear option. “Heroes� won the hour in the 18-49 demographic, while “24� – which last night proved that, in one way or another, the apple certainly does roll far from the tree – placed first in viewers, 14.05 million to 13.57 million.
Of course, the ongoing success of “Heroes� only underscores the underperformance of “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,� which follows it, and last night managed fewer than 7 million viewers, a new low for an original episode of the series. Apparently Aaron Sorkin has more to worry about than some ill-defined Schadenfreude campaign brewing over at the L.A. Times.
*
Just a little over a week ago, Fox Entertainment president Peter Liguori insisted to TV critics that Paula Abdul has “been doing this for 20 years really successfully. With our show, she gives 100 percent. America loves her. She’s successful on the show. We’re pleased with what Paula does for ‘American Idol.’�
Now, Us Weekly reports that Courtney Love has been approached with the possibility of appearing as a judge on the show, perhaps as Abdul’s replacement. So Fox, pestered by allegations that Abdul is too erratic for the show, has thrown down the gauntlet: “You want weird? We’ll give you weird!�
*
Since the Grammys always adhere to their mission to honor and celebrate the finest in cutting-edge contemporary music (I know: It queased me out just typing it), it makes perfect sense that The Police will open its 49th annual ceremony next month at Staples Center.
CBS’s press release calls the group “legendary� (apparently, in this case, “legendary� means “having made five pretty decent albums in the late-’70s/early-’80s that nonetheless haven’t really aged all that well, and then managed to milk and reconfigure that relatively meager output into yet another five compilation releases�), yet notes this will be the first time Sting et al will have performed at the Grammys. Well, of course: Since they’re no longer anywhere in the neighborhood of cool, they’ll be right at home with the Grammy folks.
Anyway, here’s hoping Sting leaves the lute at home.
*
Third time’s a charm: Will Forest Whitaker’s Oscar acceptance speech, after stammering affairs at the Golden Globes and the SAG Awards, achieve some measure of coherence?
Once again, Stephen Colbert has launched an attack on Wikipedia.
As you may recall, a while back Colbert described "Wikeality," suggesting that just as one should not trust a suicide note that concludes “Dictated but not read,� one can't really trust an encyclopedia built upon consensus. To that end, he asked fans to vandalize the Wikipedia entry on "Elephant." (The page still bears his imprint.)
Tonight, he took on Wikipedia again, spinning off the story that Microsoft had paid people to go in and change its Wikipedia entry to make it more positive. He then offered $5 to anyone who would change the site's entry on "reality" to read, "Reality has become a commodity."
Sure enough, within 12 minutes of Colbert's request, "Reality" had, indeed, become a commodity. Alas, five minutes later, Colbert's definition had been removed, though Philip K. Dick's assessment that "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away" remained intact.
Of course, who knows what the page will look like in another 10 minutes?
Herewith, a cursory round-up of items, all of which can be responded to with a simple, “What took them so long?�
And what took me so long to compile this? The blog’s server has been down or near meltdown all day.
Hard to wonder why this didn’t happen a decade or more ago, given how valuable the 18-49 demographic is to advertisers, and the low end of that demo has perennially been almost impossible to lure – or, at least, measure, since so many of them are, in fact, in college.
Former GE uberlord Jack Welch (sort of) explains NBC’s Jeff Zucker’s failing upwards:
Key exchange:
Q: If NBC isn’t doing so well, why is Jeff Zucker still in his job?
JACK: ’Cause I’m retired.
That’s a no-brainer: Anyone with just a little TV programming experience will tell you that you never, unless you have absolutely no choice, lead off an hour with a brand-new sitcom. (That probably helped prod “Big Day’s� premature exit, and accounts for why Fox’s “’Til Death� has underperformed all season.)
But the main reason for the switch is to protect “Knights� from the “American Idol� juggernaut. “According to Jim,� having run longer than anyone expected, is more deserving cannon fodder.
Hence, ABC’s new Wednesday lineup: 8 p.m., “George Lopez;� 8:30 p.m., “Knights of Prosperity;� 9 p.m., “According to Jim;� 9:30 p.m., “In Case of Emergency;� 10 p.m. (returning Feb. 7), “Lost.�
CBS has gunned down its D-List cop reality series “Armed and Famous.�
What is it about that 8 p.m. Wednesday timeslot? Nothing seems to be working there, except “Jericho,� which returns Feb. 14, and it’s not like “Jericho� is huge. But every show in the timeslot only manages between five and eight million viewers, pretty pathetic numbers.
Until “America’s Next Top Model� returns, and, bolstered by the new ratings reports from colleges, goes through the roof.
If everything proceeds apace, Eddie Murphy will become, believe it or not, the first “Saturday Night Live� acting alumnus to win an Academy Award.
Few, I’d say, could say they saw this coming, with Murphy squandering so much of his career on broad comedies like “Daddy Day Care,� “Dr. Doolittle 2,� “The Nutty Professor 2,� "The Adventures of Pluto Nash," “Showtime,� ad nauseum – another, “Norbit,� is coming soon.
Howard Shore, the show’s first musical director, won three Oscars for his music (two Best Score, one Best Song) for the “Lord of the Rings� movies.
Other “SNL� veterans to earn Oscar nominations, by the way: Albert Brooks, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Marc Shaiman, Randy Quaid (though his Oscar nomination came a decade before his “SNL� tenure), Joan Cusack and Robert Downey, Jr.
Only one winner amidst those taking home SAG awards Sunday night wasn't repeating their performance at the Golden Globes just two weeks ago: Chandra Wilson, named best actress in a drama series for her role on "Grey's Anatomy."
Of course, she went on to give the speech of the night: “It’s about those 10 cast members sitting over there and the other one in rehab,� she said, wryly if pointedly referring to Isaiah Washington, who entered rehab this past week after blurting out a homophobic epithet on the set back in October and again after the Golden Globes. Then, suggesting she doesn't offer the conventional idea of beauty, she said, “With this skin and this nose and this height and these arms … thank you, Screen Actors Guild, for accepting me as I am!�
The only other mild surprise was "Little Miss Sunshine's" win for its ensemble cast, SAG's equivalent of a Best Picture award. "LMS" has already won the Producers Guild's Best Film trophy: Can it possibly make it a hat trick with the Oscar?
For the record, other SAG/Globe winners (is there any reason to watch the Oscars at this point): Helen Mirren ("The Queen" and "Elizabeth I"), Forest Whitaker ("The Last King of Scotland"), Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson ("Dreamgirls"), Hugh Laurie ("House"), America Ferrera ("Ugly Betty"), Alec Baldwin ("30 Rock" and Jeremy Irons ("Elizabeth I"). "Grey's Anatomy" and "The Office" were named best ensemble casts.
Just as the Screen Actors Guild Awards are about to begin, TNT seems to be undermining its whole awards gestalt by airing "Titanic" just before the ceremony. "Titanic," of course, won piles upon piles of trophies, including the Oscar for Best Picture. Today, it's considered something of a piece of kitsch.
And now they're doing that sort of ill-advised opening in which different performers relate brief autobiographical sketches then, self-satisfied, declare, "I'm (insert name here) -- and I'm an actor."
“King of the Hill� returns tonight for a 11th season that in all likelihood wasn’t supposed to happen. At the table read and a following party for the 100th episode a couple of years ago, Kathy Najimy, who voices Peggy, told me that she was of the understanding that the network was banking episodes for a 10th season but otherwise they were pretty much finished.
Happily, that wasn’t true, but obviously the show isn’t the sort of fan favorite it was a decade ago. It’s a rarity amongst animated series, too quiet a show to be able to make the sort of noise that “The Simpsons� and “Family Guy� manage on a weekly basis.
Hank (voiced by series co-creator Mike Judge) practically takes the night off for the season premiere, handing the episode off to his sensible-shoes better half Peggy, who, after her wardrobe is actively eschewed at a clothing exchange amongst her friends, worries that she’s not feminine enough. Nonsense, Hank tells her – “You’re a wife and a mother.� Hank’s clueless that way. He also happens, while trying to convince her that her wardrobe is plenty alluring, to be wearing her jeans.
During a pick-me-up trip to a shoe store, Peggy befriends Carolyn, who’s clearly a drag queen, and mistakes Peggy for one, as well, inviting her to perform in his local revue. This clearly isn’t going to bolster Peggy’s confidence all that much.
Hank’s not much help, either: “I thought most drag queens were men.�
It’s not a gut-buster of an episode – a subplot about Bobby’s backfiring practical jokes doesn’t really go anywhere – but it does end on a nice grace note, as Carolyn and his friends gather to bolster Peggy’s pride. As foreign as the concept of cross-dressing is to Peggy, she accepts them and they in turn help her to accept herself.
- “King of the Hill:� 8:30 p.m. Sunday on Fox (Channel 11).
Point out three American filmmakers who made films this year as provocative and that commented on our troubled times as evocatively as the Mexican directors Guillermo del Toro (“Pan’s Labyrinth�), Alfonso Cuaron (“Children of Men�) and Alejandro González Iñárritu (“Babel�) this year, and I’ll give you a cookie. Hell, I’ll hand you the key to Fort Knox, because you can’t do it.
“Children of Men� was probably the most overtly hyper-charged political film of the year. It took us a mere 20 years into the future, where women were infertile and humanity was playing out its string. Terrorist bombings were common occurrences; violent political cynicism was the order of the day.
“Pan’s Labyrinth� deceptively concealed its politics in its period – 1940s Spain, when and where fascism yet reigned. It concerns a young girl whose pregnant mother has married a fascist military man; the girl buries herself within layers of seeming fantasy while her reality gets ever uglier.
“Babel� is a present-day transcontinental saga linking a seemingly comfortable American couple to north Africans struggling for everyday comforts, disaffected Japanese teens and illegal Mexican immigrants. The premature death of an American couple’s infant spurs them to Morocco, where further tragedy lies.
And this is where I wonder whether Cuaron, del Toro and Iñárritu – established longtime friends – conspired: Each filmmaker employs the imperilment or death of an infant to make a larger point about our world.
In “Children of Men,� set in a world of barren women, one miraculous woman gives birth to a child; its cries – momentarily, but for a miraculous moment – put an end to rabid military strife.
In “Pan’s Labyrinth,� the child born to a fascist is secreted to an underground fantasy world, where it is protected (at least momentarily) from the horrors of Francisco Franco’s regime. Its birth is celebrated as a renaissance of purity.
In “Babel,� an American couple (Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett), having struggled through divisiveness after losing a child, are thrust into an international situation when she is shot by what are perceived as terrorists.
Each film asks, pointedly, what do we make of our children in a time of pointless war?
Each film has received Oscar nominations: “Babel’s� up for Best Picture; “Pan’s Labyrinth� seems the frontrunner for Best Foreign Language Film and “Children of Men� will vie for Best Adapted Screenplay, among others.
Clearly, non-American films can confront our urgent issues far more eloquently than other nominees.
If you’re a member of the Screen Actors Guild who hasn’t yet submitted your ballot for Sunday’s SAG Awards, what are you doing wasting your time reading this blog? (Granted, any part of that scenario is highly unlikely, but…)
Deadline for ballot submission is noon Pacific time today.
Given the deadline, one wonders how the whole Isaiah Washington controversy that erupted last week at the Golden Globes will affect “Grey’s Anatomy’s� chances in the Ensemble in a Drama Series category. (The show’s up against “24,� “Boston Legal,� “Deadwood� and “The Sopranos.�)
Clearly, it’s the hottest show in the category, the most easily addictive amongst its huge fan base (not one but two proposals of marriage in Thursday’s episode), and it demands significantly more of its cast than the second-hottest show, “24,� where everyone basically spends every frame looking as intense as possible.
But will voters want to be perceived as giving an award, at least in part, to an acknowledged homophobe? Or will they want to throw in and offer condolences to the rest of the cast for having to work with the guy?
For which show would you have voted? For that matter, any thoughts on which show – amongst “Desperate Housewives,� “Entourage,� “The Office,� “Ugly Betty� and “Weeds� – should win Ensemble in a Comedy Series?
“MXC,� Spike’s cult comedy that repurposes a particularly sadistic Japanese game show – you know the kind, those that are offered bizarre and context-free on YouTube – and fills it with breathless wordplay (much of it risqué, though you have to be quick to catch a lot of it), goes political tonight. Well, sort of.
In “The White House Vs. the World,� AKA “a diplomatic quagmire,� the Administration squares off against its critics, in games involving running across stones in a swamp, running through walls that are only occasionally run-throughable, trying to steal second base on a baseball diamond that’s more muck than sod and riding a mechanical bullfrog while shooting a watergun at a floating rubber bat. (If the YouTube clips don’t make much sense out of context, this show doesn’t make much sense even given a context.)
Naturally, tonight’s installment is not really political, just an opportunity to ladle on even more puns. Hence, contestants are named Condescenda Rice, Jenna Ann-Hauser Bush and Paul Wolfoblitzer; Donald Rumsfeld’s pun is so tasteless it’s probably best not to mention it here. When Colon Pound takes a tumble, he’s referred to as “the White House Fall guy.� Of Jack Girtha, it’s observed, “He shoots that gun as wildly as he does his mouth off.�
As usual, there are lots and lots of puns and even more incredibly cheap jokes. Sometimes you wish that writers Paul Abeyta, Peter Kaikko and Larry Strawther would take the comedic high road just a smidgen more often, but the show is so utterly dense with material that that’s clearly just not possible. So sit back, relax and enjoy what must be 40 “bucking� jokes in the five-minute bullfrog-riding sequence, inevitably entitled “Buck Off.�
- “MXC,� 12:30 a.m. tonight (actually, Saturday morning); Spike.
How do you get your show in The Museum of Television & Radio’s annual William S. Paley Television Festival? It’s quite simple, it seems: Don’t get cancelled.
Five of the 12 events will offer series stars and showrunners reflecting on getting full pickups for but one season of action. Two more have run all of two seasons. The only veterans are shows that have been honored with similar evenings before – “The Simpsons� and “American Idol.� No other old classic shows are slated to bathe in the warm wash of nostalgia.
One evening is even given over to a filmmaker, not a TV personality, unless you count �The Star Wars Holiday Special,� which its creator most decidedly does not.
Here’s the schedule (unless otherwise specified, all events begin at 7 p.m.):
Thursday, March 1: “American Idol� judges and producers debate whether they are too mean (last week) or too nice (this week). 8 p.m.
Friday, March 2: “The Office’s� brain trust and stars offer more tips on how to watch their show while looking busy at work, which is what initially kept them on the air.
Saturday, March 3: An Evening with George Lucas, which you’ll likely want to avoid unless you have a high tolerance for geeks in “Star Wars� costumes.
Monday, March 5: “Brothers & Sisters� producers and stars explain how they pulled themselves from their initial creative tailspin and, after some coaxing, Calista Flockhart will mimic her character by saying something mean about liberals.
Tuesday, March 6: “The Closer’s� Kyra Sedgwick interrogates fans, who tearfully confess they love the show. 7:30 p.m.
Wednesday, March 7: Chic serial killer series “Dexter� offers Michael C. Hall in character; mysteriously, the first 15 rows will remain empty during the presentation.
Thursday, March 8: “Nip/Tuck� talent explain whether or not they truly buy into the show's beauty-is-only-skin-deep notion.
Friday, March 9: “Prison Break� stars and producers unveil the show's new title for season three, when the convicts will have been out of prison longer than they were in it.
Saturday, March 10: “Heroes�’ creator and stars shock the crowd by revealing all sorts of spoilers for the rest of the season, such as it’s Hiro cheating during a checkers game with Peter that makes Peter go nuclear on New York.
Monday, March 12: “Ugly Betty� stars discuss whether or not they really buy into the show’s ugliness-is-only-skin-deep notion.
Tuesday, March 13: “Jericho� cast members and producers wonder why “24� got so much attention for merely nuking Valencia when they went to the trouble of blowing up half the country.
Thursday, March 15: Creators of “The Simpsons� commemorate its 18th season and upcoming 400th episode by revealing the show has been recycling old animation for the past seven seasons.
All sessions take place at the Directors Guild of America, 7920 Sunset Blvd. Tickets – ranging from $50-$25 for museum members and $60-$30 for non-members – go on sale Feb. 1 for members (phone 619-220-TIXS) and Feb. 4 for non-members at ticketmaster.com.
In the 1996 French documentary (don’t give up on this entry yet, it gets better) “Microcosmos,� we behold a dung beetle (see? better already!) in a Sisyphean struggle to roll his prized ball of dung up a hill. He repeatedly loses ground, the dung keeps rolling back; it gets stuck on a stick, which refuses it further passage. Eventually, however, at protracted length, our hero succeeds.
It’s a peculiarly exhilarating moment that reminds me of ABC’s equally touching efforts in recent years to launch a successful sitcom (except, of course, for that whole “succeeding� part).
“We have to stick with it,� ABC Entertainment president Stephen McPherson said earlier this month, sounding very much like that dung beetle (if said dung beetle could talk). “I don’t think the sitcom is dead. … It’s frustrating. It’s challenging. We definitely want bigger audiences for them. I believe that comedy is due to kind of explode.�
And so, ABC keeps nudging sitcoms up the hill of viewer indifference. “Help Me Help You� and “Big Day:� already history. “In Case of Emergency:� joining them imminently. “The Knights of Prosperity:� viewers far more apathetic than critics. “George Lopez and According to Jim:� playing out the string. “Notes from the Underbelly:� might not ever make the schedule.
(“Ugly Betty,� technically billed as a comedy, is an hourlong series with dramatic elements, and its success would compromise our theme, so we’re ignoring it here.)
And yet, that hasn’t dissuaded ABC from pushing harder. Here’s a list of ABC sitcoms in development that you won’t be watching in the 2007-08 season:
“Carpoolers:� Four guys carpool to work; discuss contemporary foibles of manhood.
Because nothing screams comedy like sitting in traffic with three other disparate individuals and making awkward conversation. You can pretty much guess the characters: Young, hip, sexually active guy; downtrodden married guy, intelligent yet comedy-deficient ethnic minority guy, crazy, eccentric guy who in the real world would not be able to hold down a job (and whose day to drive the others all dread).
“Family of the Year:� A perennially satisfied New Mexico family meets new competition for the title of “Family of the Year.�
Because nothing screams comedy like an insane drive to keep up appearances no matter what the sordid behind-the-scenes reality might be, all for the sake of a silly contest.
“Sam I Am:� A woman who awakens from a coma with amnesia tries to rebuild her life.
Because nothing screams comedy like a coma.
“The Middle:� Life in a “Roseanne�-style lower-middle-class family, only presumably without Roseanne.
Because nothing screams comedy like a superficial sociological profile of the Americans struggling most in the current economy. Even the title is condescending to its characters and its target audience.
“The Call:� L.A. paramedics rescue everyone but their own tortured souls.
Because nothing screams comedy like cribbing shamelessly from the movies “Bringing Out the Dead� and “Broken Vessels,� not to mention TNT’s drama “Saved� and even FX’s “Rescue Me.�
What would you do in the comedy arena if you were running ABC right now? Punt? Keep pushing? Develop more hourlong comedies?
Hard to tell if this is cutting-edge satire of the amorality involved in Hollywood publicity or honest insight from someone who forgot what a soul looks like, but this how-to guide for marketing DVD dreck in a dozen easy steps works well as both.
Many are obvious -- sex up the package, Cuisinart critics' blurbs, copious radio giveaways (the author refers to her market as "film(s) made for radio"), overemphasize a bit player who has since achieved stardom. Others are more amusingly diabolical:
"MySpace is a key stop on the bad movie marketing tour. After creating a cool looking homepage for the film, recruiting a few celebrity “friends� and posting a deceptive, download-able trailer, it’s time to hold a contest! ... After the film has made about 10,000 MySpace friends, I send out announcements about the star studded “premiere after-party� (date and time to follow, of course) to all our new pals, asking them (did we mention the after-party?) to post a promotional banner on their own webpages. Yes, this actually works."
Only once the author got to her description of said DVD release party was I sure she was just kidding:
"The goal of the party is to have something momentous happen — D-list celebrity catfights, drunken brawls, feuding rapper shootouts — which will be later mentioned by the gossip columns and tabloid press. If done correctly, the party will not only interest the soft news media but will also catch the attention of city services such as the fire department or the local bomb squad."
Surely she's kidding about sacrificing a rapper or two just to promote remainder-pile material, right?
Right?
Just think what'd happen if someone could come up with an equally ingenious formula for selling quality stuff.
Naturally, it's a little awkward to have to sit and stare at the back of someone's head for an hour with TV cameras tightly trained upon you, but a lot of conjecture has gone into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's blinkathon during President Bush's State of the Union address last night. By contrast, however, Vice President Dick Cheney barely seemed to blink at all -- I found myself trying not to blink just to see if he would. (The average number of blinks per minute is about 32, so between Nancy's 70 bpm and Dick's 4, they actually together come close to the average.)
Radar helpfully interpreted this and other body language during the SOTU.
Here's an even more grisly shot of the smooch.
As one commenter on another blog cried in dismay, "Oh, dear. Where's that button for 'report if shockingly offensive?'"
And apparently there are more liberals in Oklahoma than you might imagine.
While Tuesday's episode of "American Idol" wasn't as immediately mean as last Wednesday's, though likewise, it was seen by about five million fewer viewers, from 37 million to 32 million.
Typical attrition or bail-out? I've heard from people offended and vowing not to watch anymore, as well as people who say anyone who goes on a reality show should understand what they're getting themselves into.
Last night's highlight probably came when one contestant reported that his audition came on the heels of his wife dumping him; after his performance, Simon Cowell surmised the guy must've serenaded his wife just before she left.
This comes after Special Olympics International declared to all who were stepping up to defend Jonathan Jayne, the Special-Olympics participant mocked on Wednesday by Simon, thanks but no thanks. "'American Idol' should be commended for providing Jayne with the same opportunity to succeed as any other contestant." its statement read in part.
This echoes Cowell's comment over the weekend, "But I will say that to suggest that someone who had (been in the Special Olympics) shouldn't be allowed to participate in this competition smacks of censorship."
So maybe Rosie O'Donnell -- who Special Olympics International may have a bone to pick with over her performance on "Riding the Bus with My Sister" -- needs to pace herself when it comes to picking fights. A battle a week will only result in feud fatigue.
Since I'm not paid to care about the Oscars, I generally don't. But the spectacle of hand-wringing over the snub of "Dreamgirls" is sort of amusing: Sure, it received eight nominations, more than any other film this year, but it didn't get the one that really counts, the Best Picture nod.
So, clearly, this is some sort of slam against some sort of minority group; in fact, it's a twofer: As it's a film about African-Americans directed by a gay man (Bill Condon) and embraced by the gay community, both blacks and gays are entitled to self-righteous umbrage today. (And if you're a gay African-American, well, my hat's off to you if your head hasn't already exploded.) Much as when "The Color Purple" led the pack in nominations but failed to win a single Oscar in 1986, or when "Brokeback Mountain," while considered the prohibitive favorite, lost the Best Picture Oscar last year to "Crash," which almost immediately was named One of the Worst Movies to Ever Win a Best Picture Oscar.
Here's the Daily News' Bob Strauss on the subject (I'd link to it, but there's no permalink feature in that blog, so it might be hard to locate without a whole lot of scrolling going on):
"If you've got to make a prejudice case for the "Dreamgirls" snub, perhaps homophobia sticks a little better. We all know that some academy voters were adamantly against giving best picture to "Brokeback Mountain" last year solely because of its sexual politics. And while there's nothing overtly queer in "Dreamgirls," it's a well-known favorite of gay men."
Fair enough, but there was also a measure of "Brokeback" burnout, of Academy members hearing for months that "Brokeback Mountain" was going to win Best Picture, no matter what, and, perhaps accepting that as gospel, decided they didn't have to cast their votes there after all. And, one should point out, homophobia scarcely prevented Condon from winning a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for the overtly gay "Gods and Monsters."
And, after all, these films were nominated in the first place; I doubt a group as lumbering and uncool as the Academy could actually manage some kind of bizarre conspiracy where they get the hopes of sundry minority groups up with a bunch of nominations, only to sadistically quash them with no wins.
Props to the Academy, however, for an ingenious solution to boring Oscar races: Simply neglecting to nominate the prohibitive Best Picture favorite.
But what about Hollywood's notorious prejudice against sardonic nihilists? That's the only thing that can account for "Children of Men" receiving a mere three Oscar nominations (well, that and Universal's miserable campaign for the film, itself delineating the studio's own biases).
The film, which takes place 20 years in the future in a world even more dissolute than our current one (but only a smidgen more), famously contains three action set pieces apparently shot in one flowing, continuous take, an act of imagination and engineering that alone should put director Alfonso Cuaron amongst the Best Director nominees. (Cuaron and some collaborators did manage a nomination for their screenplay.) The film also got a well-deserved nomination for its cinematography, as well as one for editing. Editing? Didn't I just explain that the most amazing moments in this film aren't the result of editing?
Well, great, it's come to this -- I'm trying to talk the film out of winning an Oscar it might possibly win in favor of one that it has no chance of winning. Still, the decisions that led to the nomination were those of the director, not editor.
And, Best Song? How do you not vote for "Running the World," which someday somewhere could be some country's national anthem? I'd've paid real money to watch the beads of sweat form on ABC executives during Jarvis Cocker's performance of the song, as they hovered fretfully over the guy monitoring the seven-second delay, hoping to high heaven that he'd be able to dump the audio early and often through that minefield of lyricism.
Well, “pinky toe� is right out. No one’d want to see that.
Would they?
At any rate, tonight’s episode didn't bomb, which in the case of this show isn't necessarily a good thing. It spent a lot of time introducing a bunch of characters writers were obviously hoping to throw against a wall to see which ones would stick.
The fun started with the narrator’s salacious reading of the rote disclaimer, “Viewer discretion is advised:� like it’s a boast.
Valencia’s blast left only 12,000 dead. Fortunately, we in L.A. turn out to be upwind of the blast, which means we won’t succumb to the grisly effects of radiation poisoning. But which sucks for everyone north of Valencia. And there are four more nukes out there, but it seems not all that bright to have all five nukes in L.A. How deeply into the ground do they want to blow the place, anyway?
Other thoughts on tonight’s episode of “24:�
* Learning of Curtis’s death, Chloe opines, “Why do people I know keep dying?" Has she also been losing friends over the 20 months Jack was in China? Because, otherwise, the show’s death toll last season, impressive as it was, doesn’t really qualify as “keep dying.� And the answer to her question can pretty much be answered by another question: Um, where do you work, exactly?
* The helicopter thing, where it crashed into a house; then fell to the earth, was an exciting moment, but had little to do with the overriding storyline (though it did feature an amusingly clueless guy who had no idea there had been a nuclear attack, despite the obvious presence of a mushroom cloud on the horizon). But it was essentially the only action set piece tonight.
* Assad got back to CTU awfully quickly, but then, they always particularly fudge travel time between episodes. And then they send Assad to Washington. Too bad – his knife use on that one guy’s knee last week suggested he’d serve as one great sidekick for Jack.
* Why was so much time allotted to a peripheral British terrorist character arguing with a nitwit girlfriend? Clearly, this can’t go anywhere interesting.
* Jack has major family issues. His father (who will turn out to be, next week, James Cromwell) has contact with the Russian general who gave Fayed the nukes. “I haven’t spoken to him in over nine years,� Jack notes. Of course, he has spent a lot of that time in hiding, getting tortured, in mourning and, of course, saving the country.
His brother Graham, on the other hand, is even worse: He’s championed killing him in the past. His justification: “My brother has a way of digging things up that need to stay buried.� His other justification: His wife Marilyn (Rena Sofer) is still hot for Jack (after God knows how long?).
Graham’s family is not so much distraught about the nuclear blast. Marilyn can still dredge up bitterness about her husband’s doofus-y-ness. “Insecurity in a grown man is unattractive,� she tells him. His son says, “It’s kinda been a weird day.� Hmm. I don’t remember anyone saying, on Sept. 11, “It’s kinda been a weird day.� And this is waaay beyond that.
Jack and his brother: awkward. (Though Jack doesn't know this, his brother was one of last year's bad guys.) He punches his brother, straps him to a chair and hisses, “I will rip your tongue out.� Graham whines, “You’re hurting me now;� Jack says, “Trust me: I’m not.�
Now, I’ve occasionally felt like doing that to my brother, but then, dear reader, I didn’t.
Next to Masi Oka’s Hiro, the most intriguing character on “Heroes� is Jack Coleman’s “H.R.G.,� who seemed something of an afterthought in the pilot but has since blown up into a complex, terrifically Machiavellian character. Claire’s dad is running the show, a vast, murky conspiracy against the other characters, yet still trying to protect her from whatever it is he’s up to.
Coleman, a friendly, funny guy who’s also a big fan of the Clippers’ Elton Brand, first came to prominence on the ’80s primetime soap “Dynasty.� He suggests that in contrast to that show, “Heroes� seems downright plausible.
“In some ways, ‘Dynasty’s’ plots were even more improbable,� he says with a laugh. “Crystal’s evil twin being locked up in an attic with George Hamilton for three-quarters of a season, that’s probably more improbable than bending time and space.�
Coleman says his character was a more a pair of eyeglasses than a real character at the outset.
“It was something that was written into the script from the very beginning – he was known as Horn Rimmed Glasses; there was no name,� he recalls. (He’s still simply referred to in scripts as “H.R.G.�) “Clearly, it was a look that Tim (Kring, series creator) wanted, a sort of Max von Sydow/'Three Days of the Condor' kind of character. And there’s nothing like a pair of horn-rimmed glasses that add an air of possible sinister quality to somebody. I think they just started really enjoying all the shots they could get with the glasses.�
Kring says, “Jack is a spectacular bit of casting. He committed to the show based on five lines of dialogue in the pilot, and playing a mysterious character who has little to sink your teeth into in the pilot. And a pilot is a big thing to commit to. When we cast that part, we wanted someone we would want to explore. It’s a testament to Jack that that character has become as prominent as he has.
“Jack really met us halfway and allowed us to take him in all the fun directions because he’s so fun to watch,� Kring continues. “He’s a very intelligent actor and does not lean away from a dark character, and yet that character is so grounded in wanting to be the perfect father. He’s quintessentially protective."
Coleman describes his character, dropping a couple of spoilers, so consider that in your decision to read further:
“This is a guy who has a really difficult job, but he loves his job. But as the season goes on, he’s probably having some serious second thoughts as to how much he loves his job because in the first few episodes you see a guy kind of at the top of his game, and as the season goes on, events start to overwhelm him. He’s certainly resourceful and tough and duplicitous.
“But kind of nothing’s going his way in the middle of the season. He’s lost Claire to a certain extent. For the first half of the season, H.R.G. has this big secret on Claire and for the second half, she has this big secret on him. She doesn’t know exactly what he’s up to but she knows he’s up to something. She knows his method, she knows the Haitian is his accomplice and it was intended for her and she avoided it. I don’t know what that whole double-crossing thing with the Haitian is about or how it’ll play out, but the second half of the season, she sees him through a different prism. He’s still trying to keep her out of harm’s way, but no longer does he have the advantage of her being a willing accomplice. She’s looking at him like, ‘Who are you? What is your malfunction and why am I supposed to play along with this?’�
In a scene shot the day of my set visit, H.R.G. brings his wife Sandra (Ashley Crow) home from the doctor, filling Claire (Hayden Panettiere) with even more dread. “She’s started to have her memory erased one too many times, and it’s having its effect on her,� Coleman explains.
In fact, it gets so bad that Sandra doesn’t even recognize her beloved pooch Mr. Muggles. Episode director Roxann Dawson joked, “Muggles should be stuffed in this episode and she wouldn’t notice.�
Coleman admits even he’s not sure what H.R.G. is up to. “My feeling is, it’s a sort of need-to-know basis. I have a scene today where I’ll have to ask one of the producers, ‘What does this line mean?’ Not necessarily ultimately what it means, but I need to know what I’m saying. I don’t get into the am-I-good-am-I-bad stuff. I know how to play it. Certainly, they’re going to shade it in a way that’s going to make it more clear. When I’m on the phone and ask a question about Claire, what does this mean? Not in terms of the season finale, but at this moment, what does this mean?�
Of his character, Coleman says, “I don’t think anybody in their wildest dreams would’ve thought that this character has become what he has become. The great thing Tim did fairly early on was think, ‘Wait a minute? What if this shadowy guy is her father?’ My guess is that the sort of mantra that he and the writers keep in their head is that there’s no point in anything being completely random or arbitrary. So he’s writing the shadowy character, make him connected – make him really connected. It ratchets up the ante, makes everything more interesting. So even in the pilot, where there were only three scenes and two in which I was somewhat obscure, I knew there was great potential there if everything worked out.�
Coleman concedes the specter of characters getting killed off on the show is daunting. “It’s a jittery business,� he says. “There’s little sanctuary for anyone in this line of business. You can be replaced at pretty much any time no matter what you’re doing. Certainly, this show has more of that because it’s fraught with danger. I know there were a couple of people earmarked early on that have not died because it’s working so well. It’s hard to start killing people off when you like what’s happening.�
In tonight’s episode, which takes place two weeks after the finale in the fall, H.R.G. attempts to enlist Mohinder (Sendhil Ramamurthy) to help him with his murky machinations. “Together, we can actually make a difference,� he says -- warns? promises?
Meanwhile, Claire pretends to H.R.G. that she has in fact lost her memory. Nathan (Adrian Pasdar) worries that Peter (Milo Ventimiglia) is absorbing the powers of others at a dangerous rate. Hiro locates the sword that turned up in Isaac’s painting, and turns up a new shadowy figure in the conspiracy: One Mr. Linderman.
- “Heroes:� 9 tonight on NBC (Channel 4).
The producers of Fox’s “Prison Break,� while offering carnage aplenty, must’ve been awfully chagrined that they didn’t resort to the nuclear option that “24� grabbed in hour four last week. They’ve been content to kill off characters the good old-fashioned way, via bullets.
Nonetheless, they add to their body count in an agreeably hyper-charged episode tonight. In which:
* T-Bag’s (Robert Knepper) homecoming doesn’t quite go as he hoped.
* Former prison guard Bellick (Wade Williams) decidedly learns that life in the big house isn’t nearly as much fun when you’re on the other side of the equation.
* Mahone (William Fichtner) survives getting gunned down, but soon learns he won’t be getting any Congressional Medals of Honor anytime soon, so why bother?
* Michael (Wentworth Miller) and Lincoln (Dominic Purcell) are rescued by rogue agent Paul Kellerman (Paul Adelstein), who was instrumental in Lincoln’s initial framing, but tells them, “President Reynolds ruined your life; she ruined my life.� Can they trust him? Can they not?
* Clarence Steadman, the focal point of the growing conspiracy, gets (understandably) increasingly more paranoid.
* Conspiracy adulator Bill Kim (Reggie Lee) barely flinches as his tidily planned plot undulates out of control.
Lincoln laments, tonight, “So many people dead, and he gets to live.� But does anyone get to live in “Prison Break?�
-- "Prison Break:" 8 tonight on Fox.
Fox's press session for "American Idol," in which the judges will defend themselves against charges of nastiness and loopiness and drunkenness, was supposed to have begun 40 minutes ago.
No session in the whole of this press tour fell this far behind schedule.
In two past "Idol" sessions, Paula Abdul was a last-minute no-show. Speculation is rampant that she's "running late."
The crowd is getting ugly: Rhythmic applause.
Stay tuned.
"FINALLY," it's about to begin. Abdul is in the house. Simon Cowell apologizes for the delay, saying his flight from London was late. But the session runs 15 minutes shorter than originally scheduled.
Chris Rock, executive producer of The CW’s “Everybody Hates Chris,� has a priceless bit in his standup routine parsing the differences between black people and what those with good manners – or, at least, as good of manners as one can have in discussing this issue – call “the N word.�
Following Michael Richards’ notorious fourth-quarter meltdown on the Laugh Factory stage, debate over use of the word arose anew. Paul Mooney, one of the comedy world’s edgiest comics when it comes to addressing racial issues, announced that he’ll no longer be using the word in his material.
So, when Rock casually tossed the word out during a TV press tour session touting “Chris,� the question inevitably arouse:
QUESTION: Chris, a little while ago you used the "N-word." It's a big thing kind now that we have Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson and others saying maybe you shouldn't use that at all, because you trivialize -- what are your feelings on that?
CHRIS ROCK: Oh man, I don't know. I just told my broker to buy me 80 shares of "coon."
(Laughter.)
…
TERRY CREWS: We need Michael Richards as a guest star. If he really wants to -- if he's really sorry, he will come on our show. He's welcome.
ALI LEROI: We want Michael Richards.
TICHINA ARNOLD: We want Michael Richards.
TERRY CREWS: We'll put it right here, right now, Michael Richards.
CHRIS ROCK: He's busy working on "Apocalypto II."
…
QUESTION: Seriously, would you offer a job to Michael Richards?
CHRIS ROCK: Would I offer a job to Michael Richards? Wow, I don't know. Probably. I don't know. I mean, I'd have to make sure all the other non-"n----r"-screaming people didn't need jobs first.
(Laughter.)
Once they were all working I guess I would have to give him a job.
Ricky Blitt, creator of Fox's upcoming comedy "The Winner," starring Rob Corddry as a slacker who eventually makes good, offered up some particularly noxious dirt Saturday afternoon at TV press tour.
Blitt, who sadly acknowledges his show is autobiographical, recalled that when he first moved to Los Angeles, he didn't want to drive so would have to hire drivers to cart him around town. He reports that when he would ask his chauffers who was their worst client, they would invariably say: “Faye Dunaway, she’s just a monster.�
Blitt added: "If I can do one thing as writer/creator, it’s bring down that old bitch." Thus begins his campaign...
The Television Critics Association's semiannual press tour mercifully calls it quits today at a posh hotel in Pasadena. At the beginning of the tour -- which ran two weeks; in July, it expands to an execrable three weeks -- hotel employees assiduously stocked the restrooms outside the ballroom where the press conferences take place with small hand cloths, neatly folded, rolled and stacked, adjacent to the sinks for the critics who actually attend to their ablutions following their eliminations.
Halfway through the tour, employees, scrambling to keep up with all the rampant hygiene, just folded the hand cloths in two. By tour's end, the hotel's washing machines apparently taxed beyond their limits, hand cloths disappear as they throw up their hands and just stock the joint with piles of paper towels. Which seem to dry my hands as efficiently -- if not as elegantly, or lovingly -- as the tightly scrolled hand cloths. Which sort of begs the question of why they knock themselves out with the carefully rolled hand cloths in the first place, since their eventual departure from the scene only calls attention to the eventual diminution of effort involved in pampering our mitts.
Rosie v. Trump. Trump v. Rosie. Trump v. Barbara Walters. More Trump v. Rosie. Isaiah Washington v. his senses. Katherine Heigl v. Washington. ABC v. Washington. Simon Cowell v. Kenneth Briggs and Jonathan Jayne. Rosie v. "American Idol." Yet more Trump v. Rosie. "Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll" executive producer McG v. anyone older than he. The Bush Administration v. every sentient American.
It's an ugly time out there in the Land of Television, and it'll probably get worse before it gets better, but at least one heartening rapprochement was achieved, between Bill O'Reilly (whose gotten into a few feuds himself, including an ongoing one with NBC News) and Stephen Colbert (who hates only bears).
Colbert appeared on "The O'Reilly Factor" Thursday, and then O'Reilly returned the favor, appearing on "The Colbert Report." Clearly, O'Reilly had a lot more to lose on this, but he at least managed to prove himself a good sport (something he didn't manage to do when he appeared on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart"), if not exactly an acid wit. He even managed a small smile a couple of times.
If O'Reilly can call a truce, then there's hope for us all.
Such musical incompetence has always been a hallmark of the show, and has always been what drew viewers in. After this comes the requisite albeit less-interesting winnowing phase, in which less-competent competents get jettisoned; after that comes the addictive portion of the show, in which the accomplished finalists vie for the title of winner. (This part has become less dramatic in recent seasons, since it has become understood that even the talented losers will get record deals.)
Well, the show's doing record business -- averaging 39 million viewers in its first two evenings -- so clearly, America's not so concerned about all this hand-wringing.
Nonetheless, even Rosie O’Donnell has weighed in on this burgeoning controversy on “The View,� arguing that idiots who are deluded into thinking they’re worthy of participating in the show and are summarily humiliated are being exploited by Fox.
Apparently, stars can't just go around shooting off their mouths without any repercussions. ABC has issued a statement scolding Isaiah Washington for his homophobic remarks after the Golden Globes:
“We have a long standing policy to create and maintain respectful workplaces for all our employees. We dealt with the original situation in October, and thought the issue resolved. Therefore, we are greatly dismayed that Mr. Washington chose to use such inappropriate language at the Golden Globes, language that he himself deemed “unfortunate� in his previous public apology. We take this situation very seriously. His actions are unacceptable and are being addressed.�
"Being addressed?" Sounds pretty ominous. Perhaps that sweeps episode I previously suggested in which Burke gets Bobbitted is coming sooner than we thought.
*UPDATE* Washhington has issued a statement:
"I apologize to T.R., my colleagues, the fans of the show and especially the lesbian and gay community for using a word that is unacceptable in any context or circumstance. By repeating the word Monday night, I marred what should have been a perfect night for everyone who works on 'Grey's Anatomy.' I can neither defend nor explain my behavior. I can also no longer deny to myself that there are issues I obviously need to examine within my own soul, and I've asked for help.
"I know the power of words, especially those that demean. I realize that by using one filled with disrespect I have hurt more than T.R. and my colleagues. With one word, I've hurt everyone who has struggled for the respect so many of us take for granted. I welcome the chance to meet with leaders of the gay and lesbian community to apologize in person and to talk about what I can do to heal the wounds I've opened.
"T.R.'s courage throughout this entire episode speaks to his tremendous character. I hold his talent, and T.R. as a person, in high esteem. I know a mere apology will not end this, and I intend to let my future actions prove my sincerity."
Not bad; he didn't blame booze or check into rehab. But this stuff is like toothpaste; it never goes back in the tube.
Yesterday during TV press tour, the cast of "Heroes" confronted their own mortality when asked about creator Tim Kring's intentions on killing characters off.
SENDHIL RAMAMURTHY: Stop reminding us.
GREG GRUNBERG: That is why we race to get the next script.
SANTIAGO CABRERA: I've actually died already.
MILO VENTIMIGLIA: Yeah. One of the first ones.
HAYDEN PANETTIERE: I die all the time, so it's not -- I feel like Kenny in "South Park." Like oh, my God. They killed Kenny.
MILO VENTIMIGLIA: It kind of makes the time you're on the show -- you've got to spend it wisely. You just have to keep your head focused on the page and the work of the day and make sure that it's your best work possible because it may be the last scene you're ever in. I hate to be so honest with it, but I mean --
LEONARD ROBERTS (responding wryly to Ventimiglia's melancholy ruminations): But there's no pressure. No pressure.
TAWNY CYPRESS: And we're really nice.
MASI OKA: I like to think as long as Hiro is alive you can go back in time and make everyone alive again.
“Scrubs,� the long-running NBC sitcom about upstart doctors shot in an abandoned Valley hospital, has been a perennial abandoned child on the NBC landscape, its wit and charms underappreciated by network bosses who kick it about the schedule, never allowing it to really find an audience. (Your Mayor has no idea why he empathizes so with this victim of benign neglect.)
Absolutely brilliant in its first season, the show settled into an odd self-satisfaction in subsequent seasons, before deciding to veer into the realms of the utter bizarre in recent years – perhaps showrunner Bill Lawrence decided he had nothing left to lose, so why not make it as weird and quirky as his writers could imagine?
Tonight, “Scrubs� takes its surrealism as far as it can go, with a wonderfully wacky Broadway-musical episode whose songs come from Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, the Tony-Award creative team from the Tony-winning “Avenue Q.�
In it, a patient (Stephanie D’Abruzzo, an original cast member of “Avenue Q�) collapses, then imagines her time in Sacred Heart Hospital unspools as a musical, hearing every medical assessment in song.
It’s kind of a mixed bag – an early song is entitled “Everything Comes Down to Poo� – but later songs are genuine show-stoppers, including “The Rant Song,� which allows Dr. Cox (John McGinley) and the Janitor (Neil Flynn) to rail yet again against J.D. (Zach Braff), and “Guy Love,� in which J.D. and Turk (Donald Faison) describe their friendship in terms viewers already understood, but never heard so vividly explicated (“There’s nothing gay about it in our eyes,� they croon).
In recent seasons, “Scrubs� has tread that far-flung bridge between, as the Washington Post’s Lisa de Moreas has observed, silly and sucky (perhaps that’s why Your Mayor empathizes so). Tonight’s episode emphasizes that chasm – while many of the lyrics are clever (“Friends Forever,� rhyming many medical maladies, would make Stephen Sondheim green with envy, or dyspepsia, or something involving bad digestion), many of them are, well, not so.
Still, it’s great to see that a show that the network has seemingly written off has defiantly refused to bury itself into rote punchlines, and it’s even more exhilarating to see that “Scrubs� has issued its defiance in such a way that can legitimately be described as “toe-tapping.�
- “Scrubs:� 9 tonight on NBC (Channel 4).
And of course the Rosie O'Donnell question came up during NBC's press session for "The Apprentice: Los Angeles." And it seems that The Donald is getting bored with the whole thing: He's increasingly pretty uninspired in his responses - that, or maybe he should invest in a thesaurus.
Does Trump regret getting into the urinat