January 2008 Archives

R.J. Johnson, a reader (and SAG member) sent me this missive regarding an incident at the recent SAG awards:

“Note to: SAG President Alan Rosenberg

“According to published reports from her publicist, you raised your voice to Sally Field during a discussion about the writers strike. Alan, you don’t yell at Sally Field. You don’t try to bully Sally Field. It’s just plain wrong. Pick on someone your own size. Let’s have a chat!”

According to Field’s publicist, “She thought talks should have begun sooner and was trying to relay information from other actors that contract negotiations should begin sooner rather than later, and he became incensed. She had to raise her voice to be heard over his. She has every right to express her opinion to him."

I asked R.J. if he minded if I posted his outrage at Rosenberg. He replied, go ahead, adding:

“Sally Field is 5' 2" and 61 years old. Some second banana on a sitcom like Rosenberg is going to bully her. No!”

Actually, I believe Ms. Field is more than capable of holding her own. As I can attest, as she put me in a headlock once when I asked her if she had any interest in doing a “Flying Nun” reunion show.

Nikki Finke, the go-to source for strike-related rumors of every stripe (except when the DGA reached an agreement with AMPTP while she was on vacation), says there’s encouraging progress in the talks between writers and producers.

Hey, if Nikki Finke says it, it must be true. Or not.

Meanwhile, here’s a little snapshot of how some writers are trying to avoid going slowly mad. One, a young writer hired by “Saturday Night Live” just a couple of months before the strike began, notes, "I have slightly more picketing experience than actual writing experience."

Despite the fact that a lot of people find celebrity website videographers obnoxious louts who encourage confrontation, stuff like TMZ.com and TMZ TV remain curiously addictive to the masses. But what if everyone were subjected to that same sort of random, hectoring scrutiny?

At Presidential press conferences

PRESIDENT: … and I want to thank Congress for working with me in a spirit of bipartisanship to implement these policies that will help great numbers of deserving American lobbyists. Now, I’ll take your questions.

REPORTER 1 (belligerently): Did you say something racist?

PRESIDENT: What? When? Just now? What are you talking about?

REPORTER 1 (faux genially): I saw it on a website somewhere.

REPORTER 2 (belligerently): I read it on a blog.

PRESIDENT: No, that’s absurd –

REPORTER 3 (belligerently): Are you a racist?

PRESIDENT: No, of course not. I’m here to serve all Americans. I don’t pick and choose.

REPORTER 1 (belligerently): Well, what about that website? You calling it a liar?

PRESIDENT: I don’t know what website you’re talking about, but certainly you should know by now that a lot of misinformation is disseminated on the Internet.

REPORTER 2 (belligerently): Don’t like the Internet, huh? I work for the Internet. Does that mean you don’t like me?

REPORTER 3 (belligerently): Yeah, and she’s a woman, too. Does that mean you don’t think women deserve equal rights?

PRESIDENT: This is absurd.

REPORTER 1 (belligerently): You want to hit me? You do, don’t you? Go ahead – do it! Do it!

REPORTER 3 (belligerently): Go for it! Go for it!

At the doctor

DOCTOR (belligerently): Why are you so sick?

PATIENT: Wha – ? What do you mean?

NURSE (faux genially): Are you on drugs?

DOCTOR: Are you drinking again?

NURSE (faux genially): Are you combining drugs and alcohol?

ORDERLY (belligerently): Are you cooking up crystal meth? Your face looks blotchy.

PATIENT: No, none of those things. Don’t you remember? I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer!

ORDERLY (belligerently): Who’ve you been sleeping with to get esophageal cancer?

DOCTOR (belligerently): Yeah, who?

NURSE (belligerently): Don’t you use protection?

PATIENT: What the – ? Look, I’ve got cancer. You can’t get that from sexual contact.

DOCTOR (belligerently): Oh, yeah? Who’s the doctor here?

PATIENT: You don’t need to be a doctor to know you can’t get cancer from sex.

DOCTOR (belligerently): Oh – you want to hit me? Go for it! Go for it!

At book signings

FAN 1 (faux genially): Hey, how’s it going? I hear you don’t really sign your whole name, you just kind of scribble.

AUTHOR: (Chuckles) Well, most of my name is there. My penmanship isn’t the best. Good thing I don’t write my books in longhand.

FAN 1 (belligerently): What, you saying your fans don’t deserve your entire signature?

FAN 2 (belligerently): Yeah, what’s up with that? Do you hate your fans?

AUTHOR: No, no; of course not. It’s just that I write literary fiction and I think my fans are more interested in the ideas in my novels than the autograph on the title page.

FAN 3 (belligerently): Oh, so you’re all uppity, with all your big ideas, and your fans are all too stupid to appreciate a legible autograph, is that it?

AUTHOR: No, that’s not it at all –

FAN 4 (belligerently): Do you abuse your children? Because fans want to know if you do.

AUTHOR: What? I don’t even have any children? What is wrong with you people?

FAN 1 (belligerently): Oh, you want to hit us, don’t you? Go for it! Go for it!

At a coffee shop

(An ordinary guy exits a coffee shop with his drink.)

PASSER-BY 1 (faux genially): Hey, so what you drinking there?

ORDINARY GUY: What?

PASSER-BY 1 (faux genially): It’s a simple question. What’s in your drink?

PASSER-BY 2: Is there crack in it?

PASSER-BY 3 (belligerently): Yeah, are you back to smoking the crack?

ORDINARY GUY: Who are you people? Why are you bothering me?

PASSER-BY 1 (belligerently): Hey, how’s your marriage going? You and your wife still not talking?

ORDINARY GUY: What? Who do you even think I am?

PASSER-BY 3 (belligerently): So, you’re dodging the question, eh?

ORDINARY GUY: No! Well – you know, every marriage has its ups and downs, but – wait a second! What is your problem?

PASSER-BY 4 (faux genially): Someone reportedly saw you readjusting your package – any comment?

ORDINARY GUY: Why can’t you just leave people alone? Why don’t you people just get real jobs?

PASSER-BY 2 (faux genially): Hey, a guy like you gets a mocha/caramel frappucino, rearranges his package, I think people want to know about that sort of thing.

(Ordinary guy tries to retreat back into the coffee shop; the passers-by storm in after him, scattering tables.)

ORDINARY GUY: Why are you people doing this to me? I’m just a private citizen!

PASSER-BY 3 (belligerently): I heard you’re not really a private citizen. Is that true?

(Ordinary guy tries to make his way into the restroom; passers-by try to push in behind him.)

ORDINARY GUY: What is wrong with you? I’m trying to go to the bathroom!

PASSER-BY 1 (faux genially): Oh, you got something to hide, eh?

PASSER-BY 2 (belligerently): Some sort of drug problem?

PASSER-BY 4 (belligerently): So you don’t want people seeing your package, is that it?

PASSER-BY 3 (belligerently): What? You want to hit me? Go for it – go for it!

Seems like a day scarcely passes without my receiving a missive from a cable network trumpeting its highest ratings for a night/week/month in its history. By contrast, Variety gets all gloomy-Gus with us, reporting the latest in the downward spiral that is the broadcast-network ratings landscape, particularly in wake of the writers strike (all percentages are measured vs. the networks’ ratings in the same week last year):

ABC: Down 23%
CBS: Down 26%
NBC: Down 7%
Fox: Down 15%
The CW: Down 50%

You look at NBC there and think, “Well, that’s not too bad, is it? That Ben Silverman really has rescued this network!” But Variety even rains on that parade: NBC hardly had the furthest to fall, since its ratings last season sucked something awful, and it has so far responded the most aggressively by spackling over its depleted lineup with reality shows.

As a result, NBC’s engaging in some pretty severe belt-tightening (just make sure it’s your belt and not your necktie, guys), including scaling way back on producing pilots (to just about zero) and instead ordering a number of episodes of a scripted series that they really, really like from the get-go (which’d help keep the network from having to pay actors money for nothing to keep them on retainer until they decide whether or not to pick up their pilot). (This is a little closer to what cable does in keeping its costs down.) They’re also, as we’ve previously noted, thisclose to killing the traditional May upfront where the network introduces its fall schedule to advertisers and the media.

“It's not about making less programs; it's about making less waste,” declared NBC’s CEO/Waste Management Expert, Jeff Zucker (isn't "make waste" what moms call baby poo?). “We're not going to do worse than the figures I cited for the last two years.” Which sounds about as close to raising a white flag without actually raising a white flag.

Anyway, none of this comes as a surprise, since all these things were discussed at that double super-secret background luncheon with NBC last month. If memory serves, NBC Entertainment co-chairman Marc Graboff said, “That’s a good question” to one of my questions. If memory serves, my question was, “Are you going to eat that Cornish game hen?”

As for The CW: Is it still on the air?

My heart lept with joy when I read this headline:

SARAH JESSICA PARKER TEAMS WITH MAGICAL ELVES TO EXPLORE THE WORLD OF ART

I think we’d all agree that that’s something we’d pay to see, right?

Ah, but then I read further into the press release, and my heart plunged back into its usual depths of despair: Magical Elves is the name of some production company, which, contrary to its moniker, in fact has no Magical Elves on its payroll. And all this thing is, is, yes, of course, another reality competition show. And Parker’s just an executive producer, not appearing on the show on any regular basis that the press release mentioned.

So, yeah: Group of artists all competing for a gallery show and a tour of their work. Each week, they do something different – painting, sculpting, photography, etc. – so most of what they’ll do won’t be in their genre and therefore not necessarily representative of what they do. So good luck with that. Though one week they pretty much have to be assigned to do a portrait of Parker – can’t wait to see them all get into that cubist face of hers.

Anyway, what an idea – the art world is so bitter, vindictive and simultaneously self-promoting/self-loathing it makes stand-up comics seem reasonably sane by contrast. Also, there’s no small amount of pretension, there, as well: Anyone who even auditions for the show will automatically be dismissed as a sell-out, except for the one genius who’ll do it as an act of performance art, hoping to undermine the show and reveal basic-cable reality-competition TV as the soul-draining horsesh!t that it is, but here’s betting the producers will be able to divine that individual’s true intentions ahead of time and keep him/her off the show, and so the show’ll proceed just like all these shows proceed and the winner will end up getting commissions from hotels in search of easily ignored paintings for their guestrooms.

Oh, wait: Forgot to include the requisite publicist-ese press-release quote: “We are excited to make the art world feel approachable and relatable, and are fortunate to collaborate with someone who is as passionate about art as Sarah is.”


No title yet, but I think “Watching Paint Dry” would be kind of great.

My review of HBO’s latest effort to get you hooked on Zoloft, “In Treatment,” was missing a couple of key paragraphs in print and apparently never made it to the Daily News website (maybe I got banned from all the Internets, not just my blog), so I’m going to reprint the whole thing here.

And if you don’t have the time to watch every night (and who does?) but are a little interested, the Wednesday night storyline (described below) might be the one to follow.

*

HBO’s grim new psychotherapy drama, “In Treatment,” is much like its last grim psychotherapy drama, “Tell Me You Love Me,” except without all that sex.

So why watch? The question occurred to me, as well, but soon, I had watched more than 13 hours of the series – more than five weeks in the show’s run. And the simple answer is, it’s just pretty compelling and astonishingly well acted.

Based on a hit Israeli series, “In Treatment” focuses on psychotherapist Paul Weston (Gabriel Byrne) as he treats a cross-section of his patients. The series airs in a unique fashion – a new episode with a different patient every weeknight. Some episodes (and patients) are compelling; others are pretty irritating, but the cumulative effect can be fairly overwhelming.

Every Monday, Paul meets with Laura (Melissa George). She’s slept with a lot of men but has fallen in love with Paul. The upside of these episodes is, they’re the most titillating; the downside is, it can’t end well – either he’ll betray his professional standards or the denouement will be anticlimactic.

On Tuesdays, Alex (Blair Underwood), a charismatic Navy pilot with no shortage of swagger, co-opts Paul’s counsel to justify decisions he has already made. These episodes will draw you because of Underwood’s galvanizing performances; they may lose you because they feel contrived – Alex fairly telegraphs that he’s concealing secrets that he’ll dribble out as the show’s dramaturgy requires.

Wednesdays, Sophie (Mia Wasikowska in a virtually nonpareil performance), a precocious teenaged gymnast who may or may not have tried to kill herself, consults against her will with Paul. These episodes may be the show’s most complex and heart-wrenching, as we watch the witty and seemingly fragile Sophie evolve into something approaching a monster.

If it’s Thursday, it must be time for Amy (Embeth Davitz) and Jake (Josh Charles) to drag their horrific marriage into Paul’s office. Five minutes into their first session, it’s obvious this marriage is a mess; five episodes later, you’re still left with the same conclusion.

And on Friday, Paul, battered by the brutal vicissitudes of his profession and his own unhappy home life (Michelle Forbes plays his brittle, unfaithful spouse Kate), meets with Gina (Dianne Wiest), his heretofore estranged mentor, for therapy of his own. These episodes feel superfluous, a sort of (ital) “Previously on ‘In Therapy’” (end ital) update, at least until Kate joins Paul for couples therapy with Gina.

As Paul, Byrne gives an exquisitely measured performance of a preoccupied, insular guy too lost inside his own head to notice that his real world has gone rudderless. Two weeks into the series, and you’ll likely think him an ineffectual therapist; four weeks in, you might even find him incompetent, as he attempts to shoehorn his own peccadilloes into his clients’ woes. In week five, he grows a pair and stands up to his patients, only to be utterly emasculated by Kate in front of Gina. He’s the last sort of character you’d expect to anchor a TV series, which some will consider genius and others folly.

So what (ital) is (end ital) “In Treatment,” anyway? Stripping episodes across the week makes it look like a soap opera, except that soaps are all about fantasy, not the grimmest of realities.

Perhaps it’s just a postcard from civilization and its discontents, a humane reminder that every person we see on the street has a complex backstory we simply cannot fathom, a notion that our inability to truly connect with one another is what ironically connects us all.

*

And, as with “Tell Me You Love Me,” “In Treatment” would seem to deserve its own drinking game. I’ll get back to you on that one.

- "In Treatment:" Weeknights at 9:30, HBO.

This one was inevitable: Our good friends at the Parents Television Council are going all Ed Anger at CBS because, in order to fill its schedule while the writers strike is ongoing, it will air the first season of Showtime’s “Dexter,” starring Michael C. Hall as a serial killer who works as a forensics specialist for the Miami Police Department.

“(T)he series compels viewers to empathize with a serial killer, to root for him to prevail, to hope he doesn’t get discovered. ‘Dexter’ introduces audiences to the depths of depravity and indifference as it chronicles the main character’s troubled quest for vigilante justice by celebrating graphic, premeditated murder,” the PTC sputtered with indignation. “(N)ow CBS intend(s) to air material that effectively celebrates murder?

“We are putting CBS, its affiliates, and every potential sponsor of Dexter on notice: Parents will not tolerate this type of disturbing content on the public airwaves,” they further blah blah blahed. Well, no: Responsible parents will simply not let their children, who should be in bed at that hour anyway, watch the show. It’s the PTC that can’t tolerate anything but “Jeffy McFeeble’s American Gospel Hour” on their TeeVees and is hellbent to prevent anything that might contain nuanced, mature and difficult themes from reaching the minds of American adults.

And while the show indeed “compels viewers to empathize with a serial killer,” the PTC is being condescending to an astonishing degree (even for them) with their implicit suggestion that viewers somehow don’t realize that they’re watching a TV drama and not a how-to show or Satan’s version of “The Purpose-Driven Life.” “Dexter” has been on for two seasons now and is a bona fide hit by cable standards, and I haven’t seen any uptick in the number of vigilante serial killers running amok in our country. (Well, maybe in Florida, but hey: It’s Florida.)

And “Dexter” “celebrates murder?” Well, it depicts murder, as does every other TV cop show on the planet, but Dex isn’t exactly popping open the Champagne after each kill. He’s kind of struggling with his damage – not winning, naturally, otherwise there’s no show – but his mind is fairly preoccupied with the horror he has wrought.

(Oh, and the PTC folks might want to look in their Bibles: God did a good deal of smiting Himself – Sodom and Gomorrah, the Egyptians’ first-born, the Pharaoh’s soldiers – etc. Here’s a thought, PTC guys: Maybe Dex is just emulating the Old Testament God of wrath? Does that make you like him any more?)

“Family Guy” creator Seth MacFarlane, a favorite whipping boy for the PTC, had this to say about them: “I've read their newsletter, I've visited their website, and they're just rotten to the core. For an organization that prides itself on Christian values - I mean, I'm an atheist, so what do I know? - they spend their entire day hating people. They can all [not a dirty word unless used in this context] my [not a dirty word when used as a gentleman’s name, which it isn't here, so it's pretty dirty] as far as I'm concerned.”

In other news, the PTC also assailed the children’s song “Pop Goes the Weasel” today. “The very notion that children should delight in exploding weasels is troubling, to say the least,” it declared in a statement. “Evidence has shown that children take cues on how to lead their lives from monkeys, and if monkeys will sadistically pop weasels, we are rapidly and uneasily approaching the day where children will en masse be placing weasels in microwave ovens to replicate their simian friends’ behavior.”

You may have noticed a curious lack of posts over the past few days. This is because, I have been told by The Mayor of Television’s Technical Support Staff©, my “IP address has been blacklisted by the server.”

Boy, everyone’s a critic.

Obviously, it seems to be working now. But I can take a hint.

Chad Nackers and Joe Randazzo, a couple of the guys responsible for the Onion’s latest literary effort, “Our Dumb World: The Onion’s Atlas Of The Planet Earth (Seventy-Third Edition)” (Little Brown, $27.99), showed up out of the blue this evening at Skylight Books in Los Feliz and started imposing this educational slide show about the globe on the store’s patrons. It was terrifying.

Suffice it to say, “Our Dumb World” – an exhaustive (if not always accurate), country-by-country evisceration of our fair planet – finds multiple ways to find even African genocide funny, so it probably belongs on your bookshelf or coffee table.

Afterwards, during the Q&A (first question: “Who are you guys and why did you just try to educate us?”), Nackers and Randazzo estimated that the Onion staff wrote somewhere around 400,000 jokes for the book, in addition to maintaining their popular satirical website. (I think about 300,000 of those jokes survived to make it into the book – really, there’s a gag on virtually every square inch of every page of the book (except, you know, the endpages, the title page and the page with all the publishing information on it) (they contend only about 35,000 jokes made it into print).)

Other fun facts:

* The Onion’s first book of original material, “Our Dumb Century,” an inspired stroll down the 20th century’s memory lane, was originally going to be published by Hyperion, a Disney imprimatur. Until, that is, their editors censored about 75% of the book – anything political, anything about sex, anything about Walt Disney being cryogenically frozen, etc.

* Believe it or not, a few topics can be in such bad taste that the Onion won’t even go there, or their lawyers won’t let them.

One story that never made it online: A report on how when “To Catch A Predator’s” Chris Matthews enters a nominally popular national chain restaurant, everyone inside, patrons and employees alike, flee in terror. As hilarious as it sounds, lawyers nonetheless killed this one out of fear of legal reprisals from said restaurant chain. (And yes, they said which restaurant chain.)

Two other stories that did run were eventually deleted from the Onion’s online archives when the celebrities parodied in them – Janet Jackson and Michael Bay, respectively – got huffy.

Anyway, the point of all this is that they seem like a couple of decent guys and their book is funny, so you should buy it. Unless you're poor, in which case save your money.

AMC and Lionsgate threw a pre-SAG-Awards party for “Mad Men” Friday evening at the Chateau Marmont for the cast, writers, directors, set designers, composer and others who worked on the Golden Globe winner for Best TV Drama. Somehow, I managed to get in, as well.

Creator Matthew Weiner was there, and he actually recognized me. Of course, I recognized him, too, but his achievement was far more impressive and unexpected because he saw scores of critics at July’s TV Press Tour and I saw only one creator of 2007’s best show.

Weiner doesn’t really have to do this, as he actually went to the trouble of creating a really cool show and not just writing about it, but he told me that he had read everything written about the show – “Sometimes, that’s not such a good idea,” he said self-deprecatingly – and added that he believed that critics were instrumental in keeping the show in the public eye, even when viewers weren’t exactly sure how to find AMC on their cable or satellite-TV provider.

I asked him what Lionsgate’s interim deal with the WGA meant for his show, and he disclosed perhaps the best news 2008 has heard to date:

“I go back to work on Monday,” he said. The plan at this point is that new episodes will air by late summer.

OK, you got me. There is no TV Press Tour this January. But if there were, this is the sort of thing you’d be reading right about now:

Brooke Shields on her upcoming series, “Lipstick Jungle:” “It’s about the journey of these three women, actually, and while going on this journey the women make choices just as an actor makes choices, so I’m finding I really relate to my character.”

Jeffrey Tambor on his upcoming sitcom, “Welcome to the Captain:” “I really had to dig deep to find this character. He may be a sort of generic sitcom eccentric, but he has levels of depth that are truly exciting to explore and discover as I go on this journey with him.”

Carrie Ann Inaba on “Dance Wars: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann:” “The excitement of this show is in watching these dancers as they go on this journey, to discover things within themselves that perhaps they didn’t know were there. That’s exciting for them, and that’s exciting for me, and that’s exciting for the viewers, too, I hope.”

Craig Bierko on his new sitcom, “Unhitched:” “I think there’s a lot of anxiety out there right now amongst thirtysomethings regarding relationships – will I ever meet the right person, will I ever be happy, that sort of thing. And at its heart, that’s what our show is exploring – our characters are on this journey of discovery – and then, of course, there are the monkey-sodomy jokes.”

Kyle Chandler on “Friday Night Lights:” “Yeah, people still aren’t watching. I don’t know why. But it’s been a privilege to explore this character and find out what makes him tick. He’s a man who is on a journey and I’m taking that journey with him, and I’ll do it until NBC pries my last paycheck out of my dead, cold hands.”

Executive producer Richard McKerrow on “Baby Borrowers:” “It truly is a social experiment. We’re following teenagers as they go on a journey to discover deep and profound things about themselves, and we’re doing it while trying to make money off of them at the same time.”

NBC Entertainment president Ben Silverman: “I’m very excited about our lineup during the strike. I think that what we’re putting on the air is as good as what we’d be putting on the air if there wasn’t a strike. But maybe that’s the problem.”

Lionsgate has signed an interim deal with the WGA, which means we’ll have “Mad Men” back ahead of the pack of scripted shows that’ll arrive once the writers strike is finally resolved. So I’m good.

Hey, you wouldn’t be blogging much if you had just sat through more than 13 hours of HBO’s upcoming week-nightly drama “In Treatment,” either. Talk about mad men, and women. On which, more later.

Oh, how we laughed and laughed when Heath Ledger and Brad Renfro died, right?

Oh, right: We didn’t.

Nonetheless, E!’s trying to wring entertainment from similar suffering by celebrities in a Saturday special, “25 Most Sensational Celebrity Meltdowns.” No doubt the show’s concept was conjured before these most recent buzzkill events, but it was announced after them, which makes E! look really gross and predatory.

Per their press release:

“These days it seems the only story generating more ink than a celebrity's meteoric rise to success is the headline when they inexplicably melt down. Hollywood celebrities can be notorious for their excessive and often scandalous behavior, but when these stars really lose control, their mistakes become headline news around the world.”

So here’s the countdown (no commentary needed, really, except that they clearly didn’t look beyond the past three years and how much fun can this be these days, anyway?):

25. Naomi Campbell
24. Rosie O'Donnell vs. Elisabeth Hasselbeck
23. Winona Ryder
22. John Stamos
21. Russell Crowe
20. Pat O'Brien
19. Director Lee Tamahori
18. Matthew McConaughey
17. Mariah Carey
16. Robert Downey Jr.
15. Mike Tyson
14. Paris Hilton
13. Anne Heche
12. Martin Lawrence
11. Tom Cruise

(Top 10 in random order, (as if there’s any real drama as to who’ll be named No. 1))
David Hasselhoff
Isaiah Washington
Don Imus
Mel Gibson
Britney Spears
Lindsay Lohan
Dave Chappelle
Alec Baldwin
Michael Richards
Kanye West

The Screen Actors Guild thoughtfully issued a sheet of factoids intended to inspire we mere plebes to “ooh” and “ahh” over the attention to detail that’s going into preparations for Sunday’s SAG Awards. So, here are a few highlights.

* 16,476,145 square feet of red carpet adorn the arrivals area. To put this into perspective, that’s 16,476,145 square feet more than at the recent Golden Globes.

* 700 feet of steel tubing will support 120 running feet of 22-foot-high set walls onstage, punctuated by eight gold and ivory fluted columns. Two stepped deco arches will be accented by 30 feet of translucent etched fins. To be honest, I have no idea if that’s really impressive or not, but there are a lot of numbers thrown in there, not to mention the words “fluted,” “accented” and “translucent.” Those add up to "classy," don't they?

* 3,300 gold-rimmed glasses, 2,200 pieces of gold cutlery, 1,100 gold-rimmed fluted white china chargers and 1,100 black napkins made from 200 yards of chiffon, all on 86 dinner tables. After the event, it will be down to 87 pieces of gold cutlery.

* This is an outrage: There will be but two beverage bars and two wine-tasting bars. Given how long the lines will no doubt be there, actors are encouraged to sneak in their own booze.

* Floral arrangements will be designed in a multi-pieced glass configuration lined in sensuous black velvet fabric reflecting a contemporary/organic vibe with textured elements of moss green reindeer moss, succulents and equisetum contrasting over 2,500 white orchids, 3,000 white roses, 100 white phalaenopsis orchids and 1,500 yellow calla lilies. Again, not sure as to how impressive this is, but if they had supplied a few more bars and wine-tasting sites, the “sensuous black velvet fabric” adorning the tables might’ve gotten a bit of a workout in the more tucked-away areas.

* The menu has all sorts of stuff that sounds really fancy, but probably translates into “you’re deathly allergic to it:” Tuna Niçoise with devilled eggs, black olives, haricots verts, pesto and tomatoes; Chicken Bisteeya with figs, mizuna and pomegranates; Poached Lamb Loin with basil mousse and lentil salad; Grilled Vegetable Terrine with sherry and dry cured olive focaccia. 75 pounds of almonds will be spread over the spread (so, yep, I am deathly allergic to it), as well as three gallons of Ruby Port (but that’s just for Lindsay Lohan) and six gallons of Extra Virgin Olive Oil (that’s just for William Shatner).

* Roughly 3,296 mentions of the writers strike are expected.

To help non-writers financially crippled by the writers strike, “TV Takes the Stage” will offer a weekend of one-acts by writers from shows like “The Wire,” “Desperate Housewives,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Sex and the City,” “Law & Order,” “NYPD Blue,” “My So-Called Life,” “Invasion” and “Tell Me You Love Me, among others.

There’s a couple of different sets of shows (no titles were provided, unfortunately, because clever, quippy titles are always a good lure for an evening of one-acts). Aaron Tracy, striking writer and executive producer/creator of “TV Takes the Stage,” promises, “The plays range pretty widely in subject matter from the night Marie Antoinette and King Louis first shared a bed, to the chat-room entrapment of child predators. We have sixteen writers from sitcoms to dramas to HBO shows, so you're going to get a little of everything. We’ve got sitcom writers trying finally to earn their Tennessee Williams yearbook quotes, and we’ve got Pulitzer finalists bored with starting every script with a dead body.”

Cast members include Bonnie Somerville, Troy Evans, Kari Matchett, Reid Scott, Melissa Sagemiller, Ben Feldman, David Greenman – all of whom you actually may have seen on your TV. The one-acts – some of which will be staged, others just presented as readings – will be performed Thursday, Jan. 31 through Saturday, Feb. 2 at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 p.m. and Sunday at noon at Macha Theatre, 1107 N. Kings Rd. West Hollywood.

Order tickets ($25-$20) at the link above or call (323) 960-1052.

Ever the folks to draw a smiley face on tragedy, TV Guide has taken it upon itself to divine the winners in the writers strike. As opposed to the rest of us, who are clearly the losers, TV Guide trolled around and found some folks who are benefiting from the lack of original scripted material:

* “American Idol.” Even though its ratings are actually down a little bit from last year, they might be down even more if it had any competition.

* Politicians. “The 2008 race for the White House has become the most compelling unscripted drama on TV,” the magazine suggests. (They must not be watching “Celebrity Rehab,” an even bigger trainwreck.) It’d be nice, though, if TV’d spend more time on the issues than the horserace, but that's probably another reason to put the pols in the winner's circle. Also, politicians are getting face time on the late-night shows, and with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert not at full speed, their missteps aren’t getting eviscerated as pointedly as they might otherwise be.

* Shows “on the bubble.” With development season all but kaput, struggling shows like “Reaper,” “Life” and “Back To You,” TV Guide surmises, might be brought back for a second season as there won’t be enough new series to replace them.

* Internet TV: More people drifted to online sites like YouTube in the wake of the strike. Now that even more people realize they can watch whatever they want whenever they want, are TV schedules trudging that much closer to becoming extinct dinosaurs?

* Reality TV. So far, the reality shows replacing scripted series haven’t tanked, or, at least, haven’t tanked any worse than many of the shows they’re replacing. In fact, NBC’s “American Gladiators” is scoring higher ratings than any of the scripted shows the network premiered this season.

Again: If those are the winners, then we really are the losers.

“I slept in, because, you know, I was tired. And there’s not much buzz in categories like mine. And no one called me and woke me up, because I spend my days alone in darkened rooms hunched over reams of little pieces of film trying to put them together in some comprehensible order, so I don’t really have that many friends. So, about midday, I went over to the Oscar website and noticed that I was nominated, and then I went back to what I was working on. Oh, and it’s a real honor.”

-- Juliette Welfing, nominee for Achievement in Film Editing, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly”

“Well, it was a challenging assignment, because we were in this big room filled with old car parts and hammers and stuff, and we had to smash them together at random and shout out ‘Ka-Pow! Ka-Pow!’ and ‘Bwoooosh!’ and ‘Shpeeee-oooooo! P-Tang!’ all day. So it’s nice to see all that effort geting recognized.”

-- Ethan Van der Ryn, nominee for Achievement in Sound Editing, “Transformers”

“I would say that it’s an honor just being nominated up against these other four supremely talented individuals. I would say that, but I can’t, because I’ve never heard of any of them except Colleen Atwood – doesn’t she pretty much win every year? And I’d say it’s really quite unexpected and lovely, except that’s not quite the case, either – you work on one of these big costume epics and you’re pretty much a lock for a nomination.”

-- Alexandra Byrne, nominee for Achievement in Costume Design, “Elizabeth: The Golden Age”

“To be honest, I worked on that so long ago I don’t really remember anything about it. But I must confess, I’m ashamed of being the person responsible for the phrase ‘the Oscar-nominated film “Norbit.”’”

-- Rick Baker, nominee for Achievement in Makeup, “Norbit”

Looks like Fred Thompson left “Law & Order” for no good reason, after all: He has dropped out of the Presidential race.

Thompson, apparently mistaken for the lovably gruff D.A. he played on “L&O,” was called upon by many to join the race nearly 10 months ago. He was seen by more than a few people as the potential savior for a Republican Party beset with a fairly lackluster group of candidates, but took his sweet time to enter the race, not announcing his candidacy until September, after his popularity in polls had already crested. Thompson announced his candidacy on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” but his heart didn’t really seem to be in it – I think he actually put himself to sleep with the somnolent responses he gave to Jay’s softball questions.

So make room for the Ron Paul juggernaut that’ll no doubt grab for Thompson’s votes.

You can’t watch a sporting event on television without being subjected, in virtually every commercial break, to the spot where the guy’s driving along in his SUV and a bunch of animals jump in through the sunroof and start singing along to “Rock Me Gently,” a ditty that no doubt scored Andy Kim scads of groupies when he’d sing it on tour but Jesus does it make my ears bleed. (Here’s how bad this commercial is: Even though I’ve seen it far too many times, I don’t really pay that much attention to commercials, so not until this last airing did I finally notice that it’s for Jeep. For some reason, I always thought it was for Toyota.)

Anyway, my point: I don’t think it’s a very realistic premise. It seems unlikely that animals living in the wild would have had a chance to have heard the song enough times to have memorized its lyrics.

Kiefer Sutherland was released from jail at 12:05 a.m. today. He was reportedly a “model prisoner.” Well, of course; he had plenty of experience in those 18 months of sadistic captivity at the hands of the Chinese.

Still, kind of odd that Kiefer did a full stretch of 48 days while Lindsay Lohan put in no more than 84 minutes for all her car-jacking/cocaine-possessing craziness. Maybe if Sutherland had additionally shot a guy he could’ve gotten his sentence down to a tidy 86 minutes.

As part of my community-outreach program, Your Mayor is beginning a Volunteer Celebrity Driver Program wherein You, My Constituents, offer to taxi a besotted celebrity home after an evening of too much brain-addling merriment. Sign up in the comments section below: List the celebrities you’d be willing to chauffeur and the days and times (preferably midnight-5 a.m.) you’re available. A brief and spotty background check may be necessary. TMZ employees and paparazzi need not apply.

As part of its green initiative, NBC is recycling props and wardrobe from its sundry shows into cash to keep it afloat during the writers strike. An auction begins today at 4 p.m. (PCT) and continues through Jan. 30.

Some of the stuff they’re auctioning off includes reproductions of Tim Sale’s “Heroes” art, a Dwight Schrute bobblehead autographed by Rainn Wilson, a “Me Want Food” T-shirt from “30 Rock” and a football playbook from “Friday Night Lights” signed by Kyle Chandler.

So if you’ve ever dreamt of adorning your living space with a print of Hayden Panettiere sprawled out on an autopsy table, well, the gods are smiling upon you. NBC says “a portion of the proceeds” will go to United Way.

In 1975, songwriter Neil Innes joined the members of Monty Python’s Flying Circus onstage in New York and memorably declared: “Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve suffered for my music. Now it’s your turn.”

Brady Barr, too, suffers for his art. And now it’s our turn, if we can keep from laughing.

Barr’s the nutcase herpetologist who, Steve Irwin-like, pointedly blithers headlong into dangerous situations and, when the inevitable happens, screams like a girl and says “I’ve got a bad, bad bite!” 25 times in two minutes. And that bite came courtesy a python, which lies in Barr’s area of expertise. So how’s he gonna fare when he mixes it up with hippos?

We discussed “Dangerous Encounters with Brady Barr: Undercover Hippo” upon its initial announcement because the concept was so arrestingly blinkered. And the show does not disappoint (except for all the blah-blah-blah before the final 20 minutes, when finally): Barr gussies himself up in a 200-pound, Kevlar-wrapped hippo outfit hand-smeared with hippo dung and approaches hippos in the wild. There’s a reason for this, just nominally convincing, but what’s great is the spectacle of Brady in his hippo costume lumbering laboriously and clumsily about like a lush on St. Patrick’s Day. (He’s tried the same trick in a crocodile costume, too. These decoys recalled another Monty Python reference: The Trojan Rabbit in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.” Apparently hippos and crocs have really bad eyesight.

So much to enjoy: Barr picking up “hippo poo” in his bare hands to smear on his Worst Halloween Costume Ever, then, once inside, opining, “The stench is just overpowering in here … It’s eye-wateringly bad,” and coughing and spitting for effect. And you’re surprised … why? (Barr also manages to work the phrase “fecal spraying” into the show for our edification.)

“If that hippo attacks, I’m gonna have to rely on the structural integrity of my suit,” Barr intones grimly at one point. Structural integrity is about the only integrity that thing has.

Generally, though, he addresses the audience as if he’s speaking to extremely dim children: “I’m in position on the Hippo Highway,” “These are the most horrifying live sounds ever heard from any animal,” etc. etc. For all this silly behavior and expense, the conclusion is pretty anti-climactic and the only educational tidbit I retained from it is, hippos sure can bite hard.

Here’s a clip but be patient: You don’t get to see the suit until three minutes in, and even longer to see him move around in it.

- “Dangerous Encounters with Brady Barr: Undercover Hippo,” 9 p.m. Sunday, National Geographic Channel.

Quite the 2007 Adult Swim’s “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” had. First, boyoboy did they get in trouble with the City of Boston, which flew into an absolute panic when some viral-marketing Lite Brite boards plastered around town were mistaken for a terrorist plot to destroy the city. Good times.

Then, they released a movie that was pretty much incomprehensible to most critics and was in general too long to sustain the show’s Dadaism, which is just fine in short 11-minute bursts. The movie made all of $5,520,368, enough, however, for an Adult Swim press release to call it “successful.”

And now they’re back where they belong, on late-night basic cable. “ATHF” returns for a new season Sunday, except that Master Shake, Meatwad and Frylock are nowhere to be seen. Instead, their neighbor Carl sells their home to a family of box-shaped robots (motto: “The universe is our bathroom”) with the requisite complications.

But the really interesting episode will air Feb. 3. It’s entitled “Ridiculous.” I will recap its plotline sans commentary herewith, and allow you to decide which is stranger: This episode or the astonishing string of comments left by one Jose Garcia on a recent post (you’ll have to scroll down a little past all the invective, but, really, it’s worth it – for a while, at least; is it actually David Foster Wallace off his meds?).

Anyway, “ATHF:” “Ridiculous” (oh, and: SPOILERS): Master Shake puts Meatwad’s kitten in the microwave; it explodes. Meatwad is sad. Meatwad will later put Master Shake’s kitten in the microwave with similar results. As Frylock presides over a feline funeral in the backyard, they notice Carl riding a space-ship-y-looking and loudly buzzing machine called “Re-Dick-U-Lous,” with a large tube strapped to his phallus. Said machine’s purpose is to enlarge and pleasure male genitalia. Frylock, who has had his fair share of misadventures with Carl, hypothesizes – correctly, it turns out – that a lamentable consequence will result. And indeed, Carl’s groin and fecal matter begin to glow, something Carl attributes to “minor side effects.” Carl eventually becomes concerned enough to call the company help line, where he gets what anyone gets when they call a company help line. Carl’s feces, which he has liberally left in the “ATHF’s” backyard, reanimates the menagerie of dead pets buried there into a zombified army of pleasure-seeking, STD-addled beings. Master Shake avails himself to the pleasures offered by Meatwad’s dead-now-zombified pet ape and contracts a zombie STD. Frylock attempts to kill Master Shake by separating his brain from his spine with an axe. It doesn’t work. Frylock laments that he should not have trusted Wikipedia for information on how to kill zombies.

I swear: That’s the plot. So now you’ll either tune in or spend the rest of your life wondering how something like that got on Television.

- “Aqua Teen Hunger Force:” 11:45 p.m. Sunday, Adult Swim.

They’re calling it the End of Western Civilization (unaware that Western “Civilization” called it quits long ago), and you can be part of it!

Well, sort of. You can subject yourself to the embarrassments forthcoming on “The Moment of Truth,” Fox’s upcoming reality-game show in which contestants are strapped to a lie-detector gizmo and asked really humiliating questions while family and friends watch. A “Truth Booth” will be tooling around town Friday through Monday.

You can check it out Friday 9 a.m.-4 p.m. and Saturday noon-6 p.m. at Hollywood and Highland, and Sunday and Monday 11 a.m.-5 p.m. on the Third Street Prominade between Banana Republic and Barnes & Noble.

On an episode of the Colombian version of the show, a woman admitted she had hired a hit man to off her husband (the show was thereupon yanked from the air): What kind of question provoked that?

Maybe they’ll ask it of you when you enter the “Truth Booth.”

Media Matters for America, a media watchdog group or, if you’re Bill O’Reilly, a “far-left smear website,” has abandoned O’Reilly for the time being to go after MSNBC blowhard Chris Matthews. Specifically, Matthews’ creepy, condescending sexism, particularly when he’s discussing Hillary Clinton, a problem Matthews acknowledged on his show today.

Matthews’ finest moment as a repellent lech came, memorably, last August when he was interviewing CNBC reporter Erin Burnett and got waaay off-topic:

MATTHEWS: Could you get a little closer to the camera? … Come on in closer. No, come in -- come in further -- come in closer. Really close.

BURNETT: What are you -- what are you doing?

MATTHEWS: Just kidding! You look great! Anyway, thanks. Erin, it's great to -- look at that look. You're great.

BURNETT: I don't even know. I'm going to have to go look at the tape here. I'm in a strange location. …

MATTHEWS: No, you're beautiful. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. You're a knockout.

But Matthews steps up his woman-hating to an impressive degree in his obsession with Clinton, which does not derive from her being a “knockout.” He hateshateshates her, and Bill as well, for that matter. Nothing too wrong with that – plenty of people do – but Matthews rarely if ever criticizes Hillary for her policies; what sticks in his craw is that she’s a woman.

Matthews hit the trifecta last week when he demeaningly pinched Hillary’s cheek like some pervy old uncle with an adolescent before the New Hampshire primary, declared he’d never underestimate Clinton again after her win and, the very next morning, insisted, "Let's not forget -- and I'll be brutal -- the reason she's a U.S. senator, the reason she's a candidate for president, the reason she may be a front-runner is her husband messed around. That's how she got to be senator from New York. We keep forgetting it. She didn't win there on her merit. She won because everybody felt, 'My God, this woman stood up under humiliation,' right? That's what happened."

When was the last time you voted for someone out of pity?

Anyway, something of an anti-Matthews bandwagon has been firing up since late last week, and now, Media Matters’ top dog David Brock today sent NBC News president Steve Capus a public letter asking, basically, “WTF with Matthews?” (Interestingly, Brock was a prominent hit man for conservatives in the ’90s, writing a book attacking Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas hearings and the Troopergate story that nearly took down the Clinton Administration, before the scales fell from his eyes and he took to atoning for his sins by pointing out cases of bias in reporting.)

Brock begins with a laundry list of some of the idiotic stuff Matthews has said, then gets to the point:

“Why NBC apparently believes such conduct and speech to be informative, appropriate or responsible broadcasting in the public interest is a question for you and for General Electric's management and Board of Directors.”

Then gets off it again, if a little amusingly:

“In this regard, I should note that gender-based attacks have also been ... on MSNBC's show ‘Tucker,’ hosted by Tucker Carlson. Carlson invoked Lorena Bobbitt to claim that Clinton is tapping into women’s anger toward men, and ... said of Clinton: ‘[W]hen she comes on television, I involuntarily cross my legs.’ During a discussion of how gender might play into Senator Clinton's candidacy, Carlson's right-wing guest Cliff May said, ‘At least call her a Vaginal-American.’”

Then gets back to it again:

“(P)rograms like ‘Hardball’ define wider media narratives and agendas and shape public perceptions about public affairs, especially, as is the case now, when the nation is poised to make critical choices about its future direction. Given Matthews’ record detailed above, I fear that he will continue to insult, misinform, and ultimately disserve the public as we continue to engage in a basic process of our democracy in the coming months.

“Mr. Capus, during the controversy last spring surrounding Don Imus' racist and sexist remarks broadcast on MSNBC … we commended your acknowledgement that NBC has a responsibility to protect the network's trusted reputation for fair and equal coverage and to ‘continue the dialogue about what is appropriate conduct and speech’ on its air. In the case of Chris Matthews, I implore you to once again consider the gravity of that responsibility.”

A letter from women’s leaders such as Gloria Steinem and NOW president Kim Gandy also landed on Capus’s desk today, saying much the same thing:

“Matthews’ history proves that when discussing prominent female figures, he is prone to overt sexism rather than civil political discourse.”

The thing is, just about all TV punditry is showbiz disguised as analysis. You can be brilliantly insightful but if you’re dull, you’re going to lose your airtime to a colorful idiot (which explains why Ann Coulter’s on news shows and not relegated to Chuckle Huts in the deep South).

If Matthews is going to weave “My mommy didn’t love me enough when I was little” or “Pretty girls wouldn’t talk to me in high school” through his narrative threads and people are still going to pay him heed, then Capus probably isn’t going to do too much. Time and again Matthews has said things that should pretty much discredit any opinion that leaks from his brainpan out through his mouth, but there he is, still on the air.

So Brock has diagnosed a symptom, not the disease.

Interestingly enough, there’s speculation out there – from pundits! – that Matthews’ antics have actually helped Hillary, that they’ve underscored, in harsh relief, the bozo-kind of coverage that has dogged her campaign from the beginning. And voters with real-world concerns are sick of hearing about her cleavage or her weird laugh or whatever peccadillo pundits are picking at today and finding the bulk of her policy ideas to be fairly sane. Compared, at least, to Matthews’ rabid misogyny.

As I was writing this, Matthews issued a mea culpa on the air:

“Some people whom I respect, politically concerned people like you who watch this show so faithfully every night, people like me who care about this country, think I've been disrespectful to Hillary Clinton, not as a candidate, but as a woman. …

“Was it fair to imply that Hillary's whole career depended on being a victim of an unfaithful husband? No. And that's what it sounded like I was saying and it hurt people I'd like to think normally like what I say, in fact, normally like me. As I said, I rely on my heart to guide me in the heated, fast-paced talk we have here on ‘Hardball’ -- a heart that bears only goodwill toward people trying to make it out there, especially those who haven't before.

“If my heart has not always controlled my words, on those occasions when I have not taken the time to say things right, or have simply said the inappropriate thing, I'll try to be clearer, smarter, more obviously in support of the right of women -- of all people -- the full equality and respect for their ambitions. So, I get it. … Saying that Senator Clinton got where she's got simply because her husband did what he did to her is just as callous, and I can see now, it comes across just as nasty, worse yet, just as dismissive.”

After a mere five days of talks, the Directors Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have agreed to a new contract. A joint statement was issued:

"The agreement between the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and the Directors Guild of America establishes an important precedent: Our industry’s creative talent will now participate financially in every emerging area of new media. The agreement demonstrates beyond any doubt that our industry’s producers are willing and able to work with the creators of entertainment content to establish fair and flexible rules for this fast-changing marketplace.

"We hope that this agreement with DGA will signal the beginning of the end of this extremely difficult period for our industry. Today, we invite the Writers Guild of America to engage with us in a series of informal discussions similar to the productive process that led us to a deal with the DGA to determine whether there is a reasonable basis for returning to formal bargaining. We look forward to these discussions, and to the day when our entire industry gets back to work."

Said contract gives the directors what the writers have wanted, including residuals for online usage of their material.

So why wouldn’t AMPTP give the same to the writers?

Of course, the Writers Guild of America has a couple of other sticking points, such as reality TV. Reality TV is directed, so the DGA is good to go there, but it’s ostensibly not written. So we’ll see if the writers hunker down on that one.

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Gil Cates, producer of the upcoming Academy Awards ceremony scheduled to air on ABC on Feb. 24, revealed some of his contingency plans to ensure that the broadcast will run smoothly: Writers outsourced to Bangalore and celebrity impersonators on the red carpet.

“The Oscars are a rite, a tradition that all of America and, indeed, the world share in, and therefore cannot be disrupted by anything so petty as a writers strike,” Cates declared defiantly. “And so I promise movie fans everywhere that there will be a pretty darn good, close approximation of the usual pageantry and pomposity, nothing like that Golden Globes debacle.”

To that end, Cates has outsourced the writing duties for the ceremony, to be hosted by Jon Stewart, to a group of comedy writers based in Bangalore, India, currently employed as telephone agents fielding complaints about Delta Airlines service from American passengers. Additionally, if stars decline to cross the writers’ picket lines, Cates will hire celebrity impersonators to attend the ceremony.

“There are a number of companies in Los Angeles that provide celebrity impersonators for parties,” Cates noted. “Why shouldn’t they attend the biggest party in the world? And if you think one Jack Nicholson is a lot of fun, just imagine how much more fun four of them would be!”

Navinchandra Mohapatra will serve as head writer. Mohapatra, who goes by “Dennis” when speaking with irate Delta customers, promises that viewers won’t notice much of a cultural difference in the humorous references.

“In Bangalore, we have a crumbling infrastructure that has led to traffic gridlock,” Mohapatra said. “I understand that Los Angeles suffers from the same problem. So our jokes about oxcarts tying up traffic will certainly resonate with the Hollywood audience!

“Additionally, I have heard about the clashes between the writers and the producers, and they are very similar to those we have in India between Christians and Hindus,” he continued. “My friend Suresh has a very funny line about the recent skirmishes in Kandhamal district when lower-caste Hindus were forced to convert to Christianity and several people were killed on Christmas Eve, sending hundreds to relief shelters. I’m sure that with just a little tinkering, we can work that into a joke about the writers strike.”

Mohapatra’s chief concern, he said, was that “Delta needs to be more competent. We’re deluged with complaint calls and, let me tell you, that really cuts into our writing time!”

Here's something you likely don't have to deal with: Invariably, when a cult show gets cancelled, I’ll get somewhere between a handful and a sh!tload of Emails from fans ranging somewhere between saddened to outraged and vowing some sort of campaign to resurrect said show and asking my help (as if I have any sort of influence over the networks, but if they seem sane and/or have a clever plan in place, I’ll mention their efforts).

Sometimes – well, once – the campaign worked (“Jericho”). Usually, however, they don’t.

But that doesn’t stop people from trying, and the latest barrage of Emails have come from fan(s) of Disney Channel’s animated “Kim Possible.” Someone scored a mailing list of TV critics without bothering to learn anything about them (such as, if they’d care, what they write about and who they write for), perhaps hoping the writers strike has left us idle so we can waste our energy trying to save a kids show.

Below, a mere sample of one such Email – I’ve received missives from Nigerian princes offering me scads of cash that were more coherent. Try to make your way through it, because some of it is transcendentally misguided.

It opens with the guy hoping Disney will renew “KP,” “cause to me its more than just a show, its inspiring” (sic) – inspiring because “(t)hey set a good example on doing the right thing and not let bad things get you down that happens in this world” (again, sic; BTW, the author of the note professes to be 21).

Yes, despite this revolutionary concept of showing Disney characters “doing the right thing,” the show is apparently kaput after four seasons (of “South Park,” the fan writes, “a show like southpark shouldnt even be aloud to be made let alone be on a 10th season”).

Our man with a mission - who hails from England - sees a long and bright future for Ms. Possible, including her coming to England to visit him specifically. He outlines a dozen seasons or more (all sic):

“(P)lease give kp the chance of a legendary run, like the simpsons for example; the simpsons is now gone on for 18 seasons, and its still going strong, but the plots and the jokes dont really move on that much; but just imagine on what kp could achieve if it went on for that long... eg. seasons 1-4 highschool, seasons 5-7 college, seasons 8-10 university, seasons 11- plus marriage, jobs, and possible kids. If you think about it the seasons in college and university wont be very differant at all, just a different social setting, and with kim narrowing her college choices to 3 outside of usa she still has her hyperspeed car, so she'll be back to middleton to see her family in a flash; and as for ron, now that hes into football, he could do a football scholarship in the same college/uni as kim. Mr barkin could be transfered to the same college and teach their, and the other cheerleaders are the same age as kim, so bonnie and the others can go to the same one too. … (A)s the kp characters get older, their characters will grow and develope, and people can relate to them, which the simpsons certainly can not.”

This guy thinks Disney Channel viewers will tune into a cartoon about a middle-aged super-hero coping with the demands of suburban, middle-class existence. Genius! (Did I mention this guy’s 21? Does he really think he'll be watching this in his 30s? From his parents' basement, no doubt.)

Dude, if you get all worked up by cartoon chicks in catsuits, just watch those TV commercials with the cartoon girl saving the world from high auto-insurance prices. She’s pretty much the same thing, and without the grossly phallic naked mole rat popping out of some guy's pants pocket. Just don't drag me into your demented fetish.

Entertainment Weekly conducted an amusing survey which found that one in five Americans apparently believe the Women’s Golf Association is on strike.

Only 2% have actually been following the strike. 44% say they’ve been watching less TV while 25% say they’ve been watching shows they ordinarily wouldn’t. 16% say they’re bored more these days, while 9% say they’re having more sex and 4% say they’re fighting with their spouse more.

So the strike has actually benefited 9% of the population.

Meanwhile, Writers Guild of America president Patric Verrone was on the Fox Business Channel today, and he kind of answered some questions, while others he just resorted to the usual boilerplate.

On whether the end deal will make up for the money lost during the strike:

“We’re on strike here for the future, particularly new media. And, what we earn back or what we’ve lost in earnings over the past few weeks – sure, you can weigh that pound for pound, dollar for dollar against the cost of the strike – but because we’re striking for the future, because we’ve got the entire wave of writers, actors and directors being paid in new media on the line, it’s incalculable.”

On whether a deal between the Directors’ Guild and producers will put pressure on the WGA:

“We’ve been just as anxious as you to hear news from the Directors’ Guild talks. We hope they make a good deal, and when they close their deal and it does become public, we’ll take a look at it very, very carefully but our strike doesn’t end until a deal is made with the writers.”

“The deal we make has more influence not only on writers but on actors down the road so there has to be a settlement that ends all of this for everyone. We’re the ones out on strike right now. We’re the ones who have to go to work before anyone does.”

On the WGA’s decision to approve the NAACP Awards:

“It’s a wedge. It’s a way to create competitive pressure. The purpose of all of this is to get a contract – to get a good contract – and by making the decisions that we’re making, we’re hoping that, strategically, the conglomerates come back to the table.”

On whether the Oscars will go on:

“I hope so. I want to have a chance to win my Oscar pool in my office too. But at this point, we need to make a deal with the conglomerates.”

And Variety’s Brian Lowry takes a mid-strike pulse-check of the industry, and makes a couple of observations that we’ve made here, as recently as yesterday (of course, Lowry is a trained professional, so when he says it, you’re to take it seriously, whereas when I say it, it’s just the gibbering of a chimp trying to fill blog space):

“Inevitably, the writers will rue many aspects of this work stoppage, which of necessity forces networks to keep throwing unscripted concepts against the wall, and some of those (such as NBC’s “American Gladiators”) will stick. Not many of these series will possess the staying power of “Cops” and “America’s Most Wanted” -- which the 1988 strike birthed -- but writers bitching about a lack of staffing jobs before will almost surely return to find fewer of them. …

“The truth, though, is that an over-reliance on reality by the major networks represents a one-way ticket to deflating parity with basic cable, eradicating the advertising premiums that separate NBC and CBS from A&E and GSN.”

Finally, here’s the Official Countdown to Armageddon, the count of how many original episodes of scripted series remain. This month will see the final original episodes of “Criminal Minds,” “Without a Trace,” “Chuck,” “Brothers & Sisters,” “Ugly Betty,” “Boston Legal,” “Private Practice,” “ER,” “Big Shots,” “Moonlight” and “Ghost Whisperer.”

That, alone, is 11 hours or TV that will have to be replaced by the likes of “Celebrity Hoedown,” “Extreme Makeover: Entertainment Industry Edition,” “Celebrity Panhandling,” “Are You Stingier Than an AMPTP Member?” and “Celebrity Hobo Makeover.”

Well, no, not really. Sorry to get your hopes up. I mean, Paula Abdul may be, but the show, it is what it is. Still.

But the show drew only 33.2 million viewers, its lowest debut in four years, and so entertainment journalists, understandably looking for any remotely interesting story during the writers strike, have opted to focus on the relatively small ratings decline.

True, the show dropped 4.2 million viewers from its premiere last season and dropped 13% in the all-important 18-49 demographic. But networks generally hope for something less than a 20% drop from a series’ premiere episode to its next, so a 13% skid in a year is hardly worrisome from Fox’s standpoint. And, even if “AI” were to lose 4.2 million viewers every season, it’d still remain a viable show for at least five more years (and, depending on how low ratings will be for the broadcast networks at that point, probably longer).

Consensus seems to be that Simon and the others were nicer than usual, and