April 2007 Archives
Last night, L.A. was in thrall to an all-star concert taped for the June 6 episode of PBS’s “Great Performances” (how do they know it’s going to be a great performance before they tape it?), “We Love Ella! A Tribute to the First Lady of Song.” Ella, of course, is the legendarily eclectic vocalist Ella Fitzgerald, who missed out on turning 90 this past Wednesday when she died in June of 1996.
Natalie Cole and Quincy Jones co-hosted the event (Cole also sang “A Tisket, A Tasket” and “Stardust”). Other performers sang songs associated with Fitzgerald – given how many songs she recorded, though, they had a pretty wide net to cast with.
Stevie Wonder covered “Too Close for Comfort,” Dave Koz and Ruben Studdard collaborated on “Do Nothing Till You Hear From Me,” Lizz Wright sang a sultry “Reaching for the Moon,” Ledisi knocked “Blues in the Night” out of the park, Wynonna Judd belted out “Ain’t Misbehavin’” and Patti Austin and Take 6 stopped the show while scatting “How High the Moon.”
No, honestly – they literally stopped the show. Austin was so electrifying the electricity in the production’s exterior mobile unit imploded (it was described as an “electrical hit”). In an evening of “Great Performances,” there was a pretty shoddy performance on the behalf of the tech guys. Austin and the guys had to try it again – and again. Fortunately, they got it on take three, not take six.
Judd also had to re-do her song, and, about two and a half hours after the production was to begin, the entire thing ground to a halt due to more electrical problems. Though a lot more performers were due to appear – James Moody, Nancy Wilson, k.d. lang, Cyndi Lauper – a fair chunk of the crowd (honed, clearly, by years of experience attending Dodger games), took this as a cue to beat the traffic home.
Having attended many tapings in the past, I’m accustomed to the halting, start-and-stop nature of the beast. But tickets were also sold to the public, for prices ranging from $50-$125, and had I forked over that kind of money for the sort of Keystone Tech Guys antics on display Sunday, I likely would not have been quite so sanguine about the experience.
In today’s Daily News, Bill O’Reilly performs his autopsy on the meshuga kerfuffle that was Rosie O’Donnell v. the world on “The View.”
O’Reilly doesn’t like O’Donnell, to be sure, but what really raised his hackles was Rosie’s buying into 9/11 conspiracies suggesting the White House somehow masterminded the tragedy. (We took note of this inanity, as well.)
What’s truly inspiring is how blind O’Reilly is to the fact that Rosie’s the flip side of his own coin. He recently opined, “Surely, you cannot allow someone to come on the air every day and vent hateful, dishonest propaganda – you just can’t allow that.” Sounds like he’s just begging to be fired.
He pursues this theme in today’s column:
“Here's how I process all of this. Rosie O'Donnell is a far-left individual who has the sympathy of many who believe what she believes, including some in the mainstream press. … O'Donnell's anti-Bush, anti-conservative tirades were useful to the radical left.”
(Uh, not really all that useful, because liberals prefer not to sound like wacko nutjobs; they like to have their arguments tethered to reality and a few facts – that’s how reasonable people are able to have rational discussions. Not that Bill would be aware of this fact.)
And:
“If O'Donnell's opinions could become mainstream, then other radical bomb throwers could get away with a lot more on the tube.”
Many of O’Donnell’s opinions – the troops should come home; Bush could be doing a better job; it’s OK to be gay; Donald Trump has gnarly hair; food is yummy – are, in fact, mainstream. But O’Reilly seems to be trying, somewhat dishonestly, to lump those in with her loopier proclamations. As for “other radical bomb throwers could get away with a lot more on the tube:” Uh, Bill, have you looked in the mirror lately?
And:
“(W)hile Fox News and a few newspapers covered Rosie O'Donnell's wild adventure, most of the other media ignored it.”
Huh? Where has he been? Even his good enemies at MSNBC have been all over this.
And, finally:
“And so this columnist has reached oracle status, at least for this week.”
To which of these definitions of “oracle” does O’Reilly imagine himself to have ascended?
“In ancient Greece and Rome, a shrine dedicated to a particular god where people went to consult a priest or priestess in times of trouble or uncertainty.”
“An ancient Greek or Roman deity that a priest or priestess would consult for advice on behalf of troubled or uncertain people.”
“A piece of advice, often in the form of a puzzle or an enigmatic statement, handed down by a Greek or Roman deity.”
Since today’s Daily News entertainment section truncated its books pages a smidgen to make room for an expanded summer movie preview, we herewith offer a diminutive online countermeasure:
The Death of the Novel, and of Books in General.
Key quote: "I don't understand why newspapers, when they want to cut space, they immediately think of depriving people who like to read."
Questions for the literate amongst us: How dire is this situation, really? And if it’s pretty worrying, then what can one do?
In related news: The CW is repeating its season finale of their Pussycat Dolls reality show tonight.
Just as Adult Swim did yesterday, the Sci Fi Channel announced three new programs debuting this summer, leaving us no choice but to make fun of them.
"Flash Gordon" (premieres August 10), unfortunately, has nothing to do with Will Ferrell and Jon Heder’s climactic figure-skating sequence in “Blades of Glory;” instead, it’s yet another take on the old comic strip about space adventurers exploring planets and battling an evildoer who goes by the moniker of Ming the Merciless. Wouldn’t it be great if people still went by names like that? Get to it, Kim Jong-il.
"Destination Truth" (premieres June 6) is “Ghost Hunters,” only with different guys and a much better travel budget – they trek to Malaysia, Chile, Argentina and Papua, New Guinea in search of mythical monsters. (I can see the show’s tagline: “We get paid handsomely to fail.”) They also go to Thailand, but I’m not sure I want to know what they get up to over there.
Derren Brown Project (premieres July 25) has yet to be titled, but at least they know who’s going to star in it: British “mentalist” Derren Brown, who, per Sci Fi, “knows your mind better than you do.” In the case of people who buy into this stuff, I’m not so sure that’s so difficult. How about for the title “At Least It’s Not That Hack John Edward?”
Those last two shows remind me how odd it is that the Sci Fi Channel airs reality shows (or, perhaps I have it all backwards, and all reality shows belong on the Sci Fi Channel). Your assignment: Cook up a “reality” series for Sci Fi; they’ve told me they’ll actually produce the best entry (well, actually, they haven’t returned my calls, but I’m sure it’s a slam dunk).
TV Guide.com, intrepidly dedicated to keeping its finger on the pulse of our society and feverishly regurgitating back to us whatever concerns us most, leapt into action and polled concerned Americans on … what else? Rosie O’Donnell and “The View.”
54.3 percent of those polled said they won’t miss O’Donnell when she takes her bungee-cord-that-dangles-her-upside-down-and-thereby-turns-that-frown-around and goes home. 33 percent said they’d like to see Megan Mullally – who, conveniently, just happens to be looking for work – replace Rosie. Another 10 percent thought O’Donnell should be replaced with another loudly kvetching plus-sized comic, Roseanne (is she using a surname these days? I lost track).
And an astonishing five percent endorsed the idea of allowing Joan Rivers back in front of TV cameras again to serve as co-host (and, no doubt, underscore how gracefully Barbara Walters has aged, by comparison). Attention, FBI profilers seeking unhinged lunatics whose psychoses might escalate into violence: Your search should begin with that five percent.
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Meanwhile, the site is also reporting that “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” will be returning – post-May sweeps. Which seems a bit odd, given that the shows that subsequently aired in its 10 p.m. Monday timeslot – “The Black Donnellys,” “Thank God You’re Here” and “The Real Wedding Crashers” – have all done even worse ratingswise.
In the first episode of its return, Matt Albie (Matthew Perry) rails against philistine Internet commentators – who make far, far less money than he does, he points out – who lack the wit and income level to appreciate just how brilliant his writing is. Danny Tripp (Bradley Whitford) asks Matt whether such critics would be kinder to his program if they, in fact, made as much money as he does. Confused, Matt quietly ponders this for a long, long time – marking the longest sustained period of silence in an Aaron Sorkin script – until Tom Jeter (Nathan Corddry) enters the office, whining about a splinter in his butt he got from shoddy set construction by the unionized crew, with Simon Stiles (D.L. Hughley) in tow, cackling, making the incident seem a lot wackier than it actually is.
The infallibility of the Internets was sadly disproved yet again when Fox News Channel’s “Fox and Friends” reported that Muslim children in a town in Maine were terrorized by a ham sandwich.
Reporters sited the town’s new “anti-ham response plan” and quoted an official as saying, “These children have got to learn that ham is not a toy.”
All well and good, but it turns out the story was a parody from a site called Associated Content, whose operators have subsequently had to go so far as to add this caveat to its posting: “EDITOR'S NOTE: THIS IS NOT AN ACTUAL NEWS STORY. IT IS A PARODY.” Nothing like explaining a joke to kill it.
To be fair, the Fox News geniuses do reference the Onion when discussing the story. “I hope we’re not being duped,” one co-host frets. “We’re not being duped,” another declares authoritatively.
Not to worry, guys: I’ve been taken in by wily, dubious reports in the past. Why, I remember when I used to believe that the Fox News Channel was a legitimate news source.
In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings, the ABC soap opera “One Life to Live” has scrapped 17 episodes due to run in May in which the storyline concerned a high-school hostage situation.
"OLTL" executive producer Frank Valentini issued a statement: "Out of respect to those affected by this devastating tragedy, especially the families, I felt that it was important to remove this story line from our show."
Likewise, Fox’s “Bones” postponed an episode involving a murdered college student, NBC’s “Friday Night Lights” erased from an episode all references to America’s educational system (and football) and CBS’s “CSI: Miami” cobbled together an episode taking place in a world where guns don’t exist.
You can reliably bet that were "Law & Order" still in production on this season, those folks would be running in the other direction, rushing to get a school-shooting episode finished in time for May sweeps.
Instead, “One Life to Live’s” May storyline will involve how its sundry characters respond to the tragic news of a colorful co-host of a morning talk show deciding not to re-up her contract.
Tonight’s debate on MSNBC amongst the Democratic Presidential candidates was – excepting former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel, who brought some energized craziness to the proceedings – a fairly muted, civilized affair, with (by design) little actual debating between the candidates.
Given the large slate of participants, the format – one-minute answers only, a few 30-second rebuttals, a few utterly bewildering questions requiring one-sentence answers (it was stupid to think that those questions demanding soundbite responses would actually garner such - after all, these are politicians we're talking about; eventually, they were abandoned), even a few questions answered simply by a show of hands (“Sanjaya or Jordin?” – wait, Ohio congressman Dennis Kucinich had to remind us that this wasn’t “American Idol”) – didn’t invite much nuance in the responses.
The first section basically concerned how much the candidates hated the war in Iraq. Mind you, they all hated it, but Kucinich and Gravel (pronounced Gra-VELL) really hated it to the point where they tried to make it seem like the other candidates liked it. How we mop up and get out didn’t get all that much lip-service, though Delaware Senator Joe Biden has staked what seems like the sanest position – divvying Iraq up in thirds so that the warring factions can live apart from one another somewhat peaceably.
Then there was the nit-picking at the flaws – Biden, asked if he can assure the American people he can stem his verbal gaffes and verbosity, answered, as eloquently and gracefully as he ever has, “Yes.” (Turns out New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson steamrollered the established one-minute mark the most of the candidates.) Former North Carolina Senator John Edwards responded to a question about his infamous $400 haircut with yet another anecdote about growing up poor. A question about the candidates’ biggest political mistake received a cursory, uninteresting once-over.
Questions on the environment quickly morphed into answers on terrorism, because Democrats have the environmental issue sewn up amongst voters for whom the issue is important, but they still have to prove they’re tough on terror. The only really interesting bit was a little testy exchange between Obama and Kucinich near the end over what to do about Iran: Kucinich wants to make them BFFs, while Obama said, somewhat ominously, “I'm not planning to nuke anybody right now.”
It was generally agreed that New York Senator Hillary Clinton and Illinois Senator Barack Obama, the campaign’s current frontrunners, did little to injure their status, but they didn’t really do much to elevate it, either. The gaffe that people will (probably dumbly) point to with Edwards came when he was asked to name his “moral leader” and, after an egregiously long pause, came up with a wan, “My Lord is important to me,” then named his wife, father, etc. Richardson seemed like a straightforward guy but didn’t seem to possess that ineffable authority folks would seek in a President. Biden’s main problem would be the fact that “experience” also means “baggage” these days in politics. Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd kind of got lost in the mix (as evidenced by his not even getting mentioned until now), except he kind of seemed to out his preteen daughters as lesbians.
But Man of the Night honors go to Gravel, who, depending on your point of view was either refreshing in his candor or utterly batsh!t crazy. (In the post-game analysis, Andrea Mitchell, admiringly, described him as a “bomb-thrower.”) During his spiels on Iraq, you could practically see the spittle flying from his mouth. He was the only guy who vehemently denounced his rivals, calling Biden “arrogant” and others “scary,” though points must be deducted for his swiping Ronald Reagan’s joke during his debate with Walter Mondale about his competition’s youth and inexperience. Afterwards, when Chris Matthews asked him where he had been for the past 35 years, he responded: “Hiding under a rock.” Keith Olbermann later joked, “Zell Miller has just endorsed Mike Gravel.”
The Republican candidates mix it up next Thursday at 4 p.m. from the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, also on MSNBC. Hopefully, they’ll ditch those one-sentence and show-of-hands questions for that one, and maybe invite Gravel to participate in that one, too.
Adult Swim today announced three new shows to be added to its late-night animated programming bloc:
“Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil:” Lucy is really Satan’s progeny, and she’s “dating a great new guy, who might just be the Second Coming.” Wouldn’t the “Second Coming,” being all-knowing and all, know who he’s dating? Anyway, Satan uses the relationship to hasten the apocalypse. Basically, “‘Left Behind’ for the Dysfunctional Teen Soul.” Or, "Chicken Soup for the Damned."
“Fat Guy Stuck In Internet:” Based on a cult online show: A computer programmer who gets absorbed into the Internets; weird stuff ensues. Basically, “‘Tron’ for Those Too Young to Know what ‘Tron’ Was.”
“Superjail:” Basically, "HBO’s 'Oz,' Only for Kids Who Already Know They’ll Require Years of Therapy in Their Adulthood."
Also: George Lucas participates in a special “Robot Chicken” episode dedicated to “Star Wars” parodies on June 17. Well, Lucas also participated in “The Star Wars Holiday Special” and made those three prequels, so he has nowhere to go but up.
Note: This information was embargoed until 3 p.m. PST, but I leaked it a full minute early, scooping the competition! What competition, you ask? Hmmm… good question…
MyNetwork – that thing you may be vaguely aware of but clearly have never watched, which sprung up like a weed through a sidewalk crack to fill the void created for affiliates when The WB and UPN merged to create The CW – has announced it won’t have an upfront this year. This, mainly because it has no product to sell, as it has scrapped its barely-watched telenovela programming and instead plugged its scheduling holes with sundry reality junk and sock-puppet theater and test patterns from foreign countries.
Instead, its sales team will approach advertising agencies on an individual basis, either plunking down a coffee tin and busking on violin or simply getting on their hands and knees and tearfully begging outright.
A recent study by the Pew Research Center found that the three worst jobs in America were: 1) Soldier serving in Iraq, 2) Constitutional Scholar in the White House, 3) MyNetwork Advertising Sales Rep.
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FX has renewed “Dirt” and “The Riches,” and Fox has steered “Drive” off its schedule after a mere four episodes.
The failure of “Drive” is enough to give network executives the cold sweats. It was clever, but not too clever; it was dumb, but not too dumb; it had an attractive cast and got decent reviews and most of all, it had lots of fancy reckless stunt-driving. Americans love their reckless driving, don’t they?
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Sarah Silverman has made an alliance with “Survivor’s” creator Mark Burnett: She’ll host and he’ll produce the MTV Movie Awards on June 3.
And MTV turned around and diminished Silverman by speaking of her in that wit-deadening language known as cliché-riddled-press-release-ese:
“‘Sarah’s irreverent, no holds barred sarcasm and humor have made her one of the hottest up and coming comedians in the industry,’ said Christina Norman, President, MTV. ‘Sarah is just the person to orchestrate the madness and keep everyone guessing about who’ll be her next target.’”
Meanwhile: Attention, talent booker for the White House Correspondents Dinner: “The Late Show with David Letterman” is presenting “Impressionist Week 2” starting April 30, so tune in and perhaps you can find your creaky, old-school entertainer for next year’s event.
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ABC’s Bob Woodruff is back in the saddle, for his second assignment since suffering severe brain trauma last year when an Improvised Explosive Device went off near him: He’ll report from Havana, Cuba on May Day. He’ll be accompanied by cameraman Doug Vogt, who was also injured alongside him.
So Rosie O’Donnell announced on Wednesday that she would not be returning to “The View,” Barbara Walters’ heretofore coffee klatch morning show exploring women’s issues and sundry inanities. The pronouncement opened genially enough:
O’Donnell: "They wanted me three years, I wanted one year, and it just didn't work.”
Walters: "We have had, to say the least, an interesting year … an exciting, fun-filled, provocative year. We have all gotten together and you will be missed. I do not participate in the negotiations for Rosie. It was between your representatives and agents. This is not my doing, just as Star Jones’ ouster had almost nothing to do with me."
Elisabeth Hasselbeck: "I think I'm kind of in denial. You are such a catalyst, you know how to just get in there, and because of that we've just taken off the shackles and had some real honest conversation here."
And then, in a sequence ABC edited, O’Donnell replied:
“Sure, Lizzy Borden. They wanted me back until the Bush Administration decided I was too much of a liability in their War on Truth. I was the only person who revealed how they masterminded 9/11, and therefore, I was toast. I’m the only person who understands how this conspiracy got started, and because of it, my voice had to be silenced.”
Joy Behar: “Uh, Rosie, you were offered a three-year deal, so maybe they didn’t want to silence you all that much. You also got a lot of ink for making fun of Donald Trump. Maybe the Bush Administration wasn’t paying you much heed because it was obvious you’d say anything for a little bit of attention.”
Rosie: “Donald Trump combs over his scalp the same way the Bush Administration combs over its myriad of sins against the American people.”
Barbara Walters: “Did I mention I had nothing to do with this? Because even if I did, I’d still want credit for it, but the fact is, I didn’t.”
Elisabeth: “Rosie, umm, let me just say that I still like you, because you manage the impossible task of making conservatives still seem nominally sane.”
Rosie: “Hey, I’ll still appear from time to time to discuss autism.”
Walters: “I’d like to point out that we have not begun our search for a replacement, because, really, how do your replace Rosie? Particularly given that Theodore Kaczynski is still incarcerated.”
The Leader of the Free World (approval rating: now at 27%, per NBC/Wall Street Journal) has apparently been possessed by demons. (See particularly photos 1, 4, 6, 9, 10 and especially 11.) CNN coverage here (alas, without anchor commentary).
This may explain his allegiance to Alberto Gonzales.
If the exigencies of our contemporary society feel a bit wearying, here’s the best sliver of hope we can extend.
“Heroes:” Plagiarizers?
Monday’s episode of “Heroes” struck me as a bit of a crib from the acclaimed ’80s graphic novel “Watchmen,” but I was too lazy to dig up my old copy and confirm the similarities. Fortunately, these guys did.
On the show, Linderman (Malcolm McDowell), a wealthy casino owner and collector of ephemera who boasts super powers, decides that in order to save the world, Manhattan must be blown up. In “Watchmen,” Ozymandias, a wealthy industrialist and collector of ephemera who boasts superpowers, decides that in order to save the world, Manhattan must be blown up.
In “Heroes,” it’s intimated that Peter (Milo Ventimiglia) – or, perhaps, Sylar (Zachary Quinto) – will, inadvertently or otherwise, detonate himself and cause the devastation. New York magazine (second link above) notes that drafts of the latest screenplay for “Watchmen” (the film has been in development for nearly 20 years) deviate from the graphic novel by having a character likewise blow himself up.
So “Heroes” cribs from “Watchmen,” which in turn kind of plagiarizes “Heroes.” I suspect this to be the work of Hiro (Masi Oka) and his time-space-continuum-bending ways.
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Nobody’s watching
It seems a number of high-rated shows haven’t been as highly rated in recent weeks.
“Lost,” “Desperate Housewives,” “Heroes,” “Ugly Betty,” “Jericho,” “24,” “The Unit,” “CSI: Miami,” all the “Law & Orders,” “ER,” even “American Idol” – and the list goes on and on – have tumbled, some precipitously, from their halcyon days.
Plenty of finger-pointing in the article: The trend blame-games daylight savings time, too many repeats, protracted hiatuses for serialized shows, DVRs, global warming, even the timid, inept manner in which most Washington journalists covered the run-up to the war with Iraq. (OK, those last two: not so much.)
Or maybe the movie studio moguls in the ’50s were right, after all: TV is just a passing fad.
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Baldwin rocks “30”
“Extra” is reporting that “The View” snagged another coup: Alec Baldwin pre-taped a segment for Friday’s show saying he doesn’t want to do “30 Rock” – or television, period, for that matter – anymore. (“Extra’s” website only has junk about the phone-mail kerfuffle, not this breaking story.)
Perhaps this is Baldwin’s weary, emotional response to the unseemly embarrassments of the past week, but if true, NBC will no doubt have to seriously reconsider its renewal of the clever but low-rated sitcom. Baldwin’s easily the funniest guy on it, and his departure would leave a huge hole in the show’s comic structure. And should he stay on but be unhappy – well, we’ve all heard in explicit detail just how much you don’t want to make Baldwin mad.
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“Survivor: The Internets”
“Survivor” mastermind Mark Burnett is going political, sort of: He’s cooked up a show employing MySpace to get its young social networkers to cook up virtual political campaigns advocating, well, whatever they want, I guess. The most successful may get face time on TV.
So: Politics contingent upon whoever has the coolest friends, can create the most distracting eye candy and can divert us away from the real issues of the day? Sounds about right.
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Howard gives it away for free
Howard Stern, perhaps a smidgen dispirited over abandoning his position as a cultural force with his move to the rarefied air of satellite radio, is offering free footage of his Sirius radio show through April 29, and even longer if he can persuade you to subscribe to digital cable. So if you haven’t yet managed to satiate your need for Internet porn, have at it.
While others are still wringing their hands over Rosie O’Donnell’s abdication of her role as purveyor of the cultural imperative at “The View” (a story this blog broke – well, at least it broke the fact that TMZ.com broke it), Your Mayor prefers to look forward, to the next pop-culture debacle, which is what Phil Spector’s murder trial promises to be.
Radar is reporting that “Dateline NBC” producer Adam Gorfain will sit on Spector’s jury, despite having (sort of) covered the case for the network. (Just what NBC News needs right now: more controversy.) Actually, Radar is reporting that Eric Longabardi of The Enterprise Report is reporting that, which is not unlike me breaking the news of TMZ.com breaking the news of Rosie’s departure.
Too bad the judge has already declared that cameras will be allowed in the court; the spectacle would’ve carried much creepier undertones had the whole thing been shot through a microcamera hidden in Gorfain’s jacket lapel.
Gorfain has also led up reports on shoddy work at DNA labs in the past, which might account for why Spector’s attorney would’ve allowed someone with so much knowledge about the case on the jury. Because, as we all know, the American justice system works best when know-nothing twits serve on juries.
OK, so we have someone conversant in DNA on the jury; seems to me that experts on hair and insanity might come in handy, as well. Perhaps Spector’s trial would be a good time to reunite Britney Spears and the Tarzana woman who refused to shave her head. That way, we make life a little easier for the poor, oppressed paparazzi, who no doubt in recent days have been fretting over which asinine celebrity to stalk. And if the jury is sequestered, all the better to help keep Britney on the wagon.
Finally, Your Mayor was able to locate a pint of Stephen Colbert’s Ben & Jerry’s new ice-cream flavor, AmeriCone Dream. Herewith, the culinary review:
“(After) particularly delicious morsels of grilled yellowtail collar, stewed radish and sticks of plum-flavored mountain yam, it’s a good thing I ordered extra sardine burgers. … Arrangements of gooey octopus sashimi popping up after ramekins of roughly chopped Spanish mackerel, bowls of room-temperature egg custard topped with sea-urchin gonads preceding chilly bowls of house-made tofu slicked with sweet miso paste, yakiniku skewers of grilled tongue coming simultaneously with a plate of braised tongue in brown sauce that could have been served at any tapas bar in Spain, but always — almost always — a bowl of ochazuke, brothy rice, at the end. … There were slices of marinated squid liver, which came as a surprise to everyone at the table — I have cleaned a lot of squid in my life, but I never knew that squids even had livers, much less livers the color, texture and very particular flavor of raw calves’ liver. This must have been a very large squid. I liked the cream cheese flavored with bonito, even when I found out the flavoring was actually fermented bonito intestines.”
Oh, sorry – that’s from a review by the LA Weekly’s Pulitzer Prize-winning restaurant critic Jonathan Gold. My bad.
Colbert’s ice cream is perfectly serviceable, though (perhaps appropriately) somewhat vanilla. Plenty of waffle cone in the mix, curled just like that ear of his, but when it comes to caramel, Colbert is pretty conservative. Ben & Jerry’s Karamel Sutra offers a more liberal dose of the flavor, and is a lot tastier for those interested in a more apolitical dessert.
But those interested in the Stephen Colbert Experience should consult this site to find where Colbert can be found selling himself out in your nation’s grocers’ freezers.
TCA Awards: Your vote almost counts
Of the scores of meaningless entertainment-industry awards distributed over the course of the year, one of the least influential is one that Your Mayor actually votes on: The Television Critics Association Awards, handed out in July around the time Emmy nominations are announced.
Early in May, the TCA will be requesting from its membership suggestions for nominations. The TCA does this because it realizes that its members (who fork over $75 per annum for the opportunity to participate in this exercise in – what? self-aggrandizement? futility?) watch far too much television and therefore our brains are way too addled to remember all the good stuff we actually saw over the course of 52 weeks, so the group invites us to jog one another’s memories as to what was the best of the past year’s contributions to the television arts.
Not that it really matters, though, since a sizable portion of the membership just votes for the most popular mainstream shows of the past year, and, even when we do reward actual excellence, Emmy voters have their heads too implanted up their sundry orifices to honor such rarefied efforts.
Still, Your Mayor, a Man of His People, is offering You the Actual Viewer of Television (Emmy voters being far too busy creating TV shows to actually watch any of it) an opportunity to contribute to the process.
Herewith, the categories in the TCA Awards. Feel free to offer your thoughts in the comments section on who and what should win. Your Mayor will post your nominations at the TCA’s website for other critics across the country to consider. (In the TCA world, winners are chosen amongst the three top vote getters, so feel free to name your three top favorites.) If your preferred candidates don’t, in fact, win, you’ll at least be able to state, as Bill Clinton told Chris Wallace, “At least I tried. That’s the difference in me and some, including all the right-wingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. … I tried. So I tried and failed.”
And, atop that, I’ll reward the best, most clever respondent, as I did with my recent “Gilmore Girls” contest, with a prize package of gorgeously lamentable TV-related promotional items. But you have to be fairly serious or incredibly inspired in your anarchic offerings to merit such booty. So vote early and often!
The categories:
* Program of the Year: Any show, be it an ongoing series or one-off, be it a drama, comedy, documentary or news show. In this, as in all categories, when describing your nominee, be creative, be passionate but above all, be articulate as to why you think your favorite deserves to win.
* Outstanding New Program: Obviously, this category honors programs that joined our ranks in the past year, such as “Heroes” or “Ugly Betty” or anything you believe elevated discourse on Television.
* Outstanding Achievement in Drama: This category goes to a specific series. And a fictitious show, at that. So don’t vote for “Dr. Phil.”
* Outstanding Achievement in Comedy: This one mirrors its predecessor’s parameters. If you vote for “According to Jim,” your credibility ebbs exponentially; if you vote for “The Colbert Report,” you make yourself look pretty smart.
* Outstanding Achievement in News & Information: On its face, this could seem like a trick category, as most TV journalism tends to be pretty facile and, even, idiotic. That’s why it’s all the more important that you seriously consider what deserves accolades here.
* Outstanding Achievement in Children's Programming: This is a category in which you could most likely influence the balloting, since a lot of TV critics don’t have kids (being incapable of procreating) and therefore don’t pay attention to such programming and therefore might be amenable to persuasive arguments for deserving winners.
* Outstanding Achievement in Movies, Mini-Series & Specials: Honestly, if you don’t mention BBC America’s “The State Within” or HBO’s “Longford,” you’ll lose all credibility in this category.
* Individual Achievement in Comedy: This category could go to a performer or a writer or producer, though again, should you neglect mentioning Stephen Colbert or Bill O’Reilly, you’ll look pretty silly.
* Individual Achievement in Drama: Again, it goes to an actor or a show-runner, so your quandary is, if, say, you want to honor “The Sopranos:” Do you vote for star James Gandolfini or series creator David Chase? (The vexing mystery is perpetuated for any drama you love – “Heroes”’ Masi Oka or Tim Kring? “The Closer’s” Kyra Sedgwick or James Duff? “Rescue Me’s” Denis Leary or … um, Denis Leary? OK, bad example.)
* Heritage Award: This goes to an old show that’s supposed to be great. I’m too lazy to list everything that’s won in the past, but that’s OK, because so are TCA members, who often overlook deserving shows in favor of stuff they can still remember (OK, so I’m not that lazy: Previous winners include “The Simpsons,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “The West Wing,” “60 Minutes” and “Nightline”). So give it your best shot.
* Career Achievement: Same as above, only it goes to a deserving individual human being (except when it doesn’t, such as when “Hill Street Blues” took the trophy; TV critics are a notoriously capricious bunch). Winners include Grant Tinker, Walter Cronkite, Lucille Ball, Johnny Carson, Bob Hope, Norman Lear, Fred Rogers, Dick Van Dyke, Sid Caesar, Bill Cosby, Carl Reiner, Bob Newhart and Carol Burnett. Pursue that line of thinking and figure out who’s been egregiously overlooked.
Also: Consider categories that the TCA should include (they’ve done reality shows in the past, but no more) and those who should win those fictitious categories (many points for originality).
Again: You’re not just championing TV that may be overlooked; you’re touting yourselves and your relative deservingness, such as it is, for cheesy tchotchkes. So your cleverness will not only serve your favorite programs, but yourself, as well: Make us proud. Or, at least, don’t embarrass us.
TMZ.com is reporting that Rosie O’Donnell will announce her departure from “The View” Wednesday. No word what she’ll move on to – or who she plans on hacking off in the future (after dissing a sizable portion of the planet, including the Chinese, fundamentalist Christians, rich white guys with bad combovers, “American Idol” fans, perky morning-show hosts and both fans of the Bush Administration and those who believe it too incompetent to pull off a well-oiled if sinister 9/11 conspiracy) – but possibilities include everything to hosting a game show to starring in a “Nip/Tuck” spinoff.
The former Queen of Nice has few fans amongst those responding to an unofficial AOL poll: 56% declared “I hate her” (as opposed to 14%, who said, “I love her”); 60% declared their opinion on her has soured since she joined the view; and 81% say they disagree with her “View” views. Perhaps most shockingly, a whopping 9% believe her attention-grabbing antics haven’t been covered by the media enough.
At any rate, Barbara Walters must be breathing more easily - after all, the last thing "The View" was intended to be was a lightning-rod for controversy.
Even if there is a Writers Guild strike, you will be spared the agony of missing out on new episodes of “Las Vegas,” as the show’s already heading into production for next season. “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” too.
"I firmly believe that the potential for a strike is much greater and more ominous than many people are saying," “L&O” mogul Dick Wolf declares.
Question: If series do crank out a bunch of episodes ahead of time, where’s the impetus for the networks to negotiate with the writers? Even if the writers do strike, the networks still have episodes to air. Who loses there?
Question: Do you think anyone will notice a downtick in the quality of “Las Vegas” given that the cast and crew didn’t get a breather to recharge their batteries? Me, neither.
*
Surprise: The FCC is still a scourge to free speech.
“A recent survey shows 75 percent of Americans think that parents, not the government, should decide what their kids see on TV,” reports First-Amendment champion TV Watch. “Nevertheless, many observers believe politicians will find it tough to vote against ‘protecting America's children,’ as the proponents of increased censorship falsely frame the issue.”
When it comes to television, “protecting America’s children” too often translates into “Preventing America’s adults from being able to behave like adults.” Which is why “The King of Queens” seems to be in a state of perpetual arrested development and prime-time game-show hosts address viewers as if they’re, in fact, not smarter than a fifth grader.
And now, the FCC is gearing up to take it upon itself to divine what “violent” and “graphic” content crosses the line. You do that, and there’ll be no reason for 14-year-old boys to watch network television at all. The very tired argument behind this is violence in the media inspires violence in the culture, but violence existed – and in far readier, much larger amounts – long before television ever did. And if someone wants to put the kibosh on violence (and good luck with that), it might make sense to go to a more primary source; for example, I didn’t notice that the Virginia Tech murderer was running around killing people by smashing them with a TV (nor did he play video games, as Dr. Phil so rabidly insisted). What won’t help is to deprive intelligent adults of mature content on television because some irresponsible parents can’t control their kids’ TV-watching habits.
*
Tonight, Logo debuts “The Big Gay Sketch Show,” which represents a milestone for the gay community in that it suggests that they are allowed to create an out TV show as middling and vaguely uninspired as those run by heterosexuals and closeted gays.
“The Big Gay Sketch Show,” oddly enough, suffers from the same constraints that bedevil the Fox News Channel’s “The 1/2-Hour News Hour;” namely, the edict that all jokes have to come from a fairly specific sensibility. In Fox’s case, all jokes have to come from a politically conservative attitude; here, every sketch must involve homosexuality in some way. The one sketch in tonight’s episode that drifts the furthest away from the show’s raison d’etre, “Political Project Runway,” is a muddled mash-up parody of Bravo’s reality programs. In it, sundry political figures try their hand at fashion design (why? no clue); one of the participants is Arianna Huffington, who is shown eating a gyro. See? It’s funny because she’s Greek.
More typical is the ehhh “Honeymooners” sketch involving a lesbian couple – Alice wants a black and white TV, so her significant other scores her an African-American transvestite in a white dress, and another in which lifestyle coaches named Chad Michael and Michael Chad attempt to instruct their gay audience on how to make ice.
So the attitude is more important here than the actual wit or execution, which is underscored in an initially promising sketch: Elaine Stritch, taking a job as a greeter at a Wal-Mart store, boozily proclaims, “The audience gets the show they deserve.”
- “The Big Gay Sketch Show:” 10 tonight, Logo.
*
During its NBA Playoff games, TNT has been promoting the hell out of something called “Heartland,” which looks suspiciously like a basic-cable take on “House,” only with Treat Williams instead of Hugh Laurie.
Per TNT’s descriptor: “Dr. Grant’s arrogance and willingness to perform risky procedures causes him to butt heads with the hospital administration.” Yep, if that’s not “House,” then it must be cribbing from the “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” movie. Ah, but get ready to cringe at how “Heartland’s” creators have decided to differentiate their show from “House:” “He works closely with his ex-wife, Kate Armstrong (Kari Matchett – ‘Invasion’), an organ-donor coordinator with whom he has a volatile relationship.”
No … really? That was the best you could do?
(Actually, "House" even tried, misguidedly, a similar narrative, with that lame Sela Ward storyline.)
Anyway, the reason these spots are in such heavy rotation during the NBA Playoffs is that TNT has also cooked up a way to connect the two – by exploiting Alonzo Mourning’s own feel-good story of how a kidney transplant saved his life. So, apparently, because you’re a basketball fan and you’re happy that Mourning survived his ordeal to win a ring last year – that, somehow, is going to convince you to watch “Heartland.” Got it?
To further muddy things up, “Heartland” debuts June 18, a day after Showtime premieres a similarly title series, “Meadowlands.” The bad news about “Meadowlands” is that it “focuses on a family trying to escape its past while confronting an even more uncertain future.” But what about their present? What is their present-day like?
*
“Dancing with the Stars” and “The Bachelor” are putting the hurt on “Heroes” and “24.” The latter two shows were hovering around 14, 15 million viewers per episode. Last night, in its first new show since “Dancing” had returned, “Heroes” had a shade under 12 million viewers, while “24” lured 10.5 million fans.
And NBC continues to toss up post-“Heroes” programming that can only make it nostalgic for the days when “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” was underperforming. “The Real Wedding Crashers” drew 7 million viewers, less than “Studio 60” on a bad night.
*
It’s just been up for a short while and only has a few clips, but The Onion News Network, a cross between the Onion newspaper and “The Daily Show,” only the reporters are perhaps even more stupid (and certainly more tasteless), is ready to appease your need for edification.
And don’t forget to read the news crawls during the reports; otherwise, you’ll miss such headlines as “Light Rain Halts Search for Missing Children,” “Soldiers' Remains Deployed to Iraq” and “Gambling Addiction Treatable with Heroin.”
From the outset, a caveat to those who have not been watching NBC’s “Heroes:” Please don’t read this entry. You’ll either think I’m a raving lunatic, or that the show’s writers are raving lunatics, which makes me a raving lunatic for trying to make sense of it. It’d be a debacle akin to an “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” neophyte trying to sit through the recent “ATHF” movie.
That said, a mild scolding to series creator Tim Kring and his brain trust for even making the slightest effort in Monday’s episode to convince us that you’d kill off Peter (Milo Ventimiglia), whose secret power is to absorb the secret powers of others. To paraphrase one of the show’s many season-one catch phrases, Eliminate Milo, Eliminate Your Entire Teenage Girl Viewership.
And that’s particularly relevant, given how the show has evolved into a particularly startling parable of teen angst, of that moment in every kid’s life when he or she discovers that Mom and/or Dad isn’t the hero one wholeheartedly believed them to be.
This has been unusually resonant in the character of indestructible cheerleader Claire (Hayden Panettiere), who came to the realization of just how sinister her father, conspiracy bagman HRG (Jack Coleman), was in terms of his job of rounding up those, like herself, with special super powers (now, he may have flipped to the side of good – or has he?). Tonight, she met, for the first meaningful time, her biological father, politician-who-can-soar-with-the-eagles Nathan (Adrian Pasdar), who also seems to be on the verge of flipping, but in his case, it would be from good to evil.
Nathan met with Linderman (Malcolm McDowell), a seemingly sinister Vegas power broker who seems to have a special ability himself, but fears that mankind may at this point be irredeemable, and that the nuclear explosion flattening Manhattan in Isaac’s (Santiago Cabrera) painting of the future represents “a brighter future.”
“This tragedy will be a catalyst for good,” Linderman suggests to Nathan, in that it could inspire “a united sense of hope couched in a united sense of fear.” (Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to “Heroes”’ baldest 9/11 metaphor.) Nathan, Liinderman promises/warns, could be the charismatic leader who emerges unscathed from the catastrophe.
(Interestingly, “Heroes” has veered into obfuscating territory that longtime fans of “24” have been expecting from their favorite whacked-out serial: What if the world was turned upside-down, and wrong became right and vice-versa? That particularly came into play on fan message boards last year, when the President of the United States was revealed to be in league with the terrorists – wait, a few timorous souls offered; what if the President really is acting in the national interest and in reality we should be rooting against Jack Bauer? Of course, we all know by now that we should never root against Jack Bauer, but “Heroes” has done yeoman-like work in muddying its waters in separating good guys and bad guys, to the extent that we’re not quite positive where our allegiances should lie. In fact, the show’s new catch phrase buys into the possibility of failure and next week’s episode takes place five years in the future, examining what might happen were our heroes not able to save the world.)
Back on point: HRG/Nathan aren’t the only parents flirting with the dark side. Ali Larter’s dueling dual personalities, Jessica and Niki, are battling, badly, over the fate of her/their son Micah (Noah Gray-Cabey). Time/space continuum-breaker Hiro’s (Masi Oka) father (George Takei) was recently introduced as an early player in whatever sort of conspiracy may be unfolding. And Nathan and Peter’s mother (Cristine Rose) was revealed on Monday to know a bit too much about whatever’s going on to make you feel too comfy to be in her presence.
All these parents, all these secrets and lies – were I a kid addictively watching this show, I’d have trouble sleeping on Monday nights, wondering what sinister plots were being launched down the hallway in my parents’ bedroom. It makes you wonder: What did Christina Crawford’s secret power end up being? Besides, of course, being able to cash in on being Joanna Crawford's daughter?
Meanwhile, self-appointed hero wrangler Mohinder (Sendhil Ramamurthy) proceeds apace as TV’s most hapless intellectual, continuously blithering into the worst of the bad guys. Isaac bought the farm, but not before outright telling evil super-powers-vacuum Sylar (Zachary Quinto) he figured out a way to stop him, a tell that Sylar seemed to outright ignore. Mind-reading doofus Parkman (Greg Grunberg) continues to establish himself as Hero Least Deserving of/Capable of Capitalizing Fully on His Abilities.
And how stupid did they think HRG was, anyway? After busting him with Candice’s (Missy Peregrym – doesn’t the actress’s name sound more like a character’s name than her actual character’s? Doesn’t “Missy Peregrym” sound like something out of Dickens?) shape-shifting abilities at the end of the previous episode, did they really think he’d fall for it again so quickly?
And Hiro met his soul-patched doppelganger from the future, which promises a really cool swordfight in a future episode or a lot of turgid plot explication during which the show’s next catch phrase will emerge.
Honestly: Imagine that you’ve never seen an episode of the show and read the above synopsis/commentary again. Wouldn’t you lobby hard to have that person committed?
Although Rich Little’s performance at the White House Correspondents Dinner absolutely killed (off the very concept of humor forever), all anyone could talk about afterwards was the showdown over global warming between Karl Rove and those West-Coast hippies Laurie David and Sheryl Crow.
David reported that Rove became immediately hostile when the subject was broached and snapped at Crow when she touched his arm. Rove, who took offense to being touched by such a plebe as Crowe, sniffed afterwards of David to the Washington Post, "She came over to insult me and she succeeded." We hope that in the future, a fragile flower such as Rove will never have to experience anything unpleasant ever again.
But Rove is correct: David and Crow are crusading do-gooders who will stop at nothing to force their polemical concerns upon the proper authorities, even if those proper authorities don’t want to hear any of it. At a recent event celebrating 25 years of celebrating 35 years of celebrating Television Pratfalls, the two altruistic harridans button-holed me, Your Mayor, on what they perceived as my reluctance to take a firmer stand on ridding the airwaves of the dehumanizing forces of reality television.
From David and Crow’s blog at the time:
“We asked The Mayor if he would consider taking a fresh look at the dismal social impact of reality television. Much to our dismay, he immediately got combative. And it went downhill from there.
“We reminded the Mayor of Television that the US leads the world in crass reality television programming and we are doing the least about it. Anger flaring, The Mayor immediately regurgitated his official position on reality television, asking us if we had ever seen any of those clips from Japanese television on YouTube, all of which are far more demeaning than even something as soul-wrenching as ‘The Hills.’
“We felt compelled to remind him that that doesn’t excuse the Good People of Television from exercising a modicum of restraint and responsibility. The Mayor exploded with even more venom. Like a spoiled child throwing a tantrum, The Mayor launched into a series of illogical arguments regarding Japan not doing enough thus neither should we. (Since when do we follow Japan’s lead?)
“In his attempt to dismiss us, The Mayor turned to head toward his table, but as soon as he did so, Sheryl reached out to touch his arm. He swung around and spat, ‘Don't touch me.’ How hardened and removed from reality must a person be to refuse to be touched by Sheryl Crow? Unfazed, Sheryl abruptly responded, ‘You can't speak to us like that, you work for us.’ The Mayor then quipped, ‘I don't work for you, I work for the People of Television.’ To which Sheryl promptly reminded him, ‘We are the People of Television.’
At that point Mr. Rove apparently decided he had had enough. Like a groundhog fearful of his own shadow, he sneered to her, ‘I should hardly think writhing about in music videos on MTV2 would count as Television,’ and scurried to his table in an attempt to hibernate for another year from his responsibility to address the scourge of reality television.”
So, Karl, I’m feeling your pain. If you need to commiserate, don’t hesitate to call. Perhaps we can cook up a reality show behind the scenes at the nation’s biggest polluter!
Google, the repository of all online truthiness, has declared Stephen Colbert the Greatest Living American. (Don’t believe me? Google Greatest Living American and see what comes up first – and second, for that matter.)
This, the result of Google-bombing, the sort of activity to which Colbert’s rabid fans apparently dedicate great swatches of their otherwise empty lives (the same folks who almost got a bridge in Hungary named after Colbert and who repeatedly vandalized Wikipedia), the kind of thing that Google was supposed to have fixed after searching for the words “miserable failure” resulted in the lead entry being George W. Bush’s White House biography. Apparently, there are still some ghosts in the machine.
The Pranksters responsible for Colbert’s latest honor have declared “Mission Accomplished:” Don’t get too cocky, guys, we all know what happened the last time someone made that proclamation prematurely. Because, you know, I still haven’t seen the Greatest Living American’s ice cream available in any grocery store.
Many fans of “The Larry Sanders Show” are hacked off that creator Garry Shandling, who has been awfully pokey in getting his show to the DVD marketplace (only the first season is available in total), opted to release a four-disk set entitled “Not Just the Best of ‘The Larry Sanders Show’” with 23 episodes from throughout the series’ run. In lieu of more episodes, it includes scads of interviews with cast members and guest-stars, many conducted by Shandling himself, which gives the package an unusually pensive, jittery tone for a comedy boxed set.
Shandling, of course, is legendary for transforming his neuroses into comic gold. But what’s at work in these interviews is more probing, more personal and largely not intended to be funny. Shandling is still trying to make sense of what became of himself while working on the show.
During the run of the series, Shandling experienced spectacular fallings-out with his former fiancée (and co-star) Linda Doucett, who turned around and sued him for sexual harassment, and his longtime manager Brad Grey (now chairman of Paramount Pictures), whom Shandling sued for duping him out of scads of cash.
I interviewed Shandling during the fourth season of the show, after Doucett had departed amidst turmoil. As always, he was a funny and perceptive guy, but was wary. “Are you going to make fun of me?” he asked. “I can go with that and I’d respect you if you did.” Later, even though the review was proceeding perfectly well, he suggested putting the kibosh on it and trying again at a later time. “I’m just feeling,” he said, searching for the right word: “unsure.”
Some of the bonus material is indeed fascinating in its depiction of Shandling’s efforts to make amends or explain himself to his collaborators. (''I wanted to objectively see the realities of that time,” he told the New York Times in January. “What was I like? What were my relationships like, with the actors and writers? What did they feel?'') There’s a particularly uncomfortable reunion with Doucett, who observes, “People want more. But even if they don’t get what they want, they still get what you gave them,” followed by a title card, scrawled in Shandling’s own hand, reading, “We all do the best we can.”
But much of it feels fairly indulgent and protracted (Shandling, seeking a warts-and-all vibe, didn’t do enough editing on the interviews). He chats while shooting hoops with David Duchovny and sparring in a boxing ring with Alec Baldwin (bad timing that this DVD collection comes out the same week as Baldwin’s phone-mail diatribe). He discusses, in a surprisingly disappointingly desultory fashion, the process of creating the show with co-stars Jeffrey Tambor and Rip Torn. In a section entitled “The journey continues,” Garry chats with a Buddhist monk for a couple of minutes.
There’s an unnecessarily extended chat with Jerry Seinfeld, in which much time is devoted to Seinfeld angsting over a missing jacket (no, seriously). While Seinfeld emerges as fairly dismissive of show business, he does seem to provide Shandling’s thesis for him: “TV wins in the end. You can kill your TV show or it can kill you.”
In a phone conversation with Jon Stewart (who, at the end of the series, wrested the show from Larry’s hands), Stewart tries to absolve Shandling of his guilt. “What should I do next?” Shandling asks; Stewart replies, “Two words: Lighten up.”
No kidding. I’d recommend Shandling re-watch Preston Sturges’ movie “Sullivan’s Travels.” In it, a comedy filmmaker aspires to create a film of penetrating social importance – or, at least, didactic pretensions (it would be called “O Brother, Where Art Thou?”, a title poached much later by the Coen brothers for their George Clooney musical comedy). Instead, watching a comedy with an appreciative audience, he comes to realize what a service getting people to laugh really is. Perhaps someday Shandling can feel good about the laughs he gave his fans.
NBC News must be feeling a little snakebit of late. First was the Don Imus mess, and now, the division finds itself having to defend itself against charges of exploiting and over-hyping the “multi-media manifesto” sent the network by Virginia Tech mass murderer Cho Seung-Hui.
This seems patently silly. We’re all agreed that this was a major news story, and the chilling look into the mind of a madman, while clearly disturbing, does advance the story, even if it fails to wrap it up with a tidy bow. And, as Slate’s Jack Shafer notes, NBC has been fairly circumspect, limiting the amount of material it has released from Cho’s mountain of hatred. Some of the carping seems to be sour grapes from the other networks’ news directors, who are no doubt miffed that it wasn’t their address on that package. (You can imagine how much more of the material would’ve been on display had Fox News gotten its mitts on it.)
Still, the network has agreed to scale back the amount of imagery it will air during its reporting – its use as “video wallpaper” – from here on out. Which seems more than appropriate, because those images are fairly seared into our eyeballs; we can call them up at will at this point.
An informal AOL poll found that more than half those who responded thought NBC had behaved inappropriately. Other critics pointed to how “upsetting” Cho’s videos and photos were. Yeah, well, life is upsetting; we’re adults here, and better come to grips with the fact that bad news can’t be sanitized for our protection (unless it’s coffins returning from Iraq). Others accused NBC of potentially inspiring copycat crimes – again, sorry, but that train left the station the moment Cho first pulled the trigger.
The San Antonio Current’s Elaine Wolff suggests that if our own appetite for what we consider news were more refined, the news networks would respond in kind: “Imagine a world in which Alberto Gonzales’s … Congressional testimony … was accorded the same drama and intense, layered coverage as the Virginia Tech murders, while the Virginia Tech victims’ friends and families were left to mourn in private. You can use your media consumption to make that world a reality.”
What do you think? Did NBC cross the line, or was the story just too ugly to soft-peddle?
When “Children of Men” was released last Christmas, critics immediately hailed it as one of the year’s best films, and perhaps one of its most prescient.
They had no idea.
Riffling through the extra features on my “Children of Men” DVD, I viewed the “Alternate Takes” section, only to find these scenes that might’ve made the film all the more chillingly relevant:
There’s a different version of the film’s opening scene, in which Clive Owen buys a coffee amidst a stricken group sadly eyeing the shop’s TV monitors, which is issuing this report:
“Our lead story: The world was stunned today by the death of Sanjaya Malakar, the Least Talented Human on the Planet. Sanjaya was stabbed outside of Buenos Aires after refusing to sign an autograph. Witnesses say Sanjaya spat in the face of a fan who asked for an autograph. He was killed in the ensuing brawl. The fan was later beaten to death by the angry crowd. Sanjaya struggled all of his life with the celebrity status thrust upon him as the Least Talented Human on the Planet.”
A later scene shows saddened fans in thrall to their computer screens as they watch former teen fans of Sanjaya pouring bouquet upon bouquet of flowers at makeshift shrines throughout the world, as a newsreader intones:
“Throughout his life, Sanjaya Malakar was a tragic reminder of the 18 years of utter talentlessness that humanity has endured, and its effect upon the world we now live in. It seems that the mantle of the World’s Least Talented Human has been passed to Jim Belushi, a one-time situation-comedy star living in Encino, California.”
An even later outtake shows Clive Owen meeting a woman who had appeared on the reality series “Flavor of Love,” and is pregnant with a child by Flavor Flav, a child who could just become the new Least Talented Human on the Planet.
The DVD also offers an unreleased version of the Jarvis Cocker song that ended the film, “Running the World:”
“Well did you hear there’s a bullsh!t show, ‘Idol’
Where the cutest end up with the most votes
Paula claims cream always rises up to the top
Well I say – sh!t floats
“That’s the way, don’t you know
From the guys that’s still running the show
Let’s be perfectly clear boys and girls
Seacrest’s still running the world
Seacrest’s still running the world
“Ah, it stinks
Yeah, it sucks
It’s musicologically unjust
The voters by talent aren’t fussed
So Seacrest’s still running the world
Seacrest’s still running the world.
"If you text-vote it’s perfectly natural
You’ll get to elevate some kind of dummy.
It’s the ideal way to order the world
F@&# the talent – does it make any money?
And if you don’t like it, then leave,
Or use your right to protest in the streets,
Yeah, use your right, but don’t imagine that it’s heard
Not while Seacrest’s still running the world
Seacrest’s still running the world
Seacrest’s still running the world
Seacrest’s still running the world.”
(end with big piano chord)
Get your copy of “Children of Men” today!
When last we checked in with “Ugly Betty,” Alexis Meade (Rebecca Romijn) had wrested control of Mode magazine from her brother Daniel (Eric Mabius), who despondently abandoned his duties and returned to hard partying and easy womanizing. Tonight, he justifies his bad behavior to Betty (America Ferrera): “I’m being exactly the way my family expects me to be.”
Still, Betty tries to protect him from a Truman Capote-esque biographer (Leslie Jordan) looking to do a smear job on the Meade family empire; he scratches one source’s back in order to put the knife in another’s. Betty’s pal Christina (Ashley Jensen), whose star is on the rise, will have none of her workaholism; she takes her to a party at a trendy club in an effort to abandon her addiction to helping Daniel. Naturally, this doesn’t go as planned.
Meanwhile, Wilhelmina (Vanessa Williams) attempts to seduce Bradford (Alan Dale) in order to sink her claws into Mode, even resorting to unorthodox means to appeal to his foot fetish, and Betty’s father Ignacio (Tony Plano) continues his pursuit of his green card, while Constance (Octavia Spencer), the woman handling his case, continues her pursuit of him. All that need be said about that last scenario is that it’s accompanied by music from “Psycho.”
As its first season nears its conclusion (the final episode airs in a mere month), “Betty” has begun focusing more on conspiracies a la Mode and less on Betty’s high-spirited whimsy – the humor seems to have been shunted to the show’s margins. It’s still stylishly entertaining, though its brain trust might want to remember that it was sold to audiences as a comedy.
- “Ugly Betty:” 8 tonight; ABC (Channel 7 locally).
I’ve only been able to stomach about an hour of coverage per day of Monday’s horrific events at Virginia Tech this week, but when it was revealed yesterday that Cho Seung-Hui had sent to NBC what Keith Olbermann contemptuously if accurately described as “a press release” of his actions (NBC News generally referred to it as “a multi-media manifesto”), I tuned into MSNBC, hoping for greater insight into the tragedy.
Big mistake. As soon as I’m there, Tucker Carlson is railing against the “far-out” stuff kids dabble in once they get to college. How f@&#ing old is Carlson, anyway? – he’s sounding like an enfeebled grandparent disapproving of kids skateboarding on his driveway. College students attempting to expand their life experience away from their parents is old hat and infinite light years away from Cho’s apparent insanity.
Later, Olbermann – whose guests usually hew to his perspective on stories – valiantly tried to contextualize the tragedy, struggling mightily to perceive clues that might help us prevent future massacres. And some of his interviewees weren’t having any of it: Olbermann wanted to approach this rationally, they explained, and truth be told, you just can’t explicate crazy.
That should’ve been readily apparent from reading Cho’s contributions to the world of creative writing, “Richard McBeef” and “Mr. Brownstone.” I took plenty of creative-writing courses in college and, while I had to plow my way through plenty of crap written by my fellow students (and they, mine) (most college fiction invariably tends to be earnest nonsense about kids in dysfunctional relationships with their parents), I never read a) stuff so structurally incoherent (this guy was a 23-year-old English major?) and b) so irrefutably insane.
It was revealed Wednesday that Cho had a darker and even more sinister background than what was previously revealed, but Tuesday’s revelation that his creative-writing profs attempted to do something about him but were rebuffed by the police because they didn’t think it sent up enough warning flags – that, one should’ve called bullsh!t upon from the outset.
First off, both one-acts are hellbent upon having young protagonists claim (rightly or wrongly, it’s unclear in both) to be victims of child-molestation. That alone should’ve been enough to prod investigators to look into, if not Cho’s background, then at least that of those around him. The casual references to violence that surrounded those accusations demanded even further investigation.
In particular, “Richard McBeef’s” lunatic lack of anything resembling coherent narrative or characterizations (it’s an utterly unmotivated précis about a guy who doesn’t like his stepfather, for reasons that keep amorphously shifting and involve chainsaws and a mother with blitheringly varying allegiances; it’s “Hamlet for Dummies”) make it nothing more than an unhinged shout-out to unfocused hatred of any kind: How does one not read it as something begging for an intervention?
As Tucker Carlson so clumsily intimated, college is a time for kids brought up in tight parental strictures to test the refreshing waters of youthful rebellion and even transgression. But Cho so obviously went beyond those parameters that one must wonder: With the hundreds, if not thousands, of innocent Americans wrongly and aggressively placed upon no-fly lists and lists of not-really felons not allowed to vote in general elections, how do we miss the true enemy within?
Kurt Vonnegut must’ve kicked James Rosen’s dog. That’s the only excuse for this Fox News hit-piece-gussied-up-as-an-obituary in which Rosen, uh, “celebrates” Vonnegut’s “despondent leftism,” notes (not altogether inaccurately, but still) "by the late seven