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DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

Bianculli's Blog

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

The Cold Light Reader

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Dateline Donovan
Contributors

DAVID HINCKLEY

All Along the Watchtower

ED BARK

Uncle Barky's Bytes

ALEX STRACHAN

TV That Matters

MIKE HUGHES

Open Mike

ED MARTIN

Ed Martin's TV Mix

KIM AKASS

Aerial View

MONIQUE NAZARETH

MNtv

BILL BRIOUX

TV Feeds My Family

ROGER CATLIN

TV Eye

GARY EDGERTON

Must-Click TV

TOM BRINKMOELLER

Raised On MTM

GERALD JORDAN

Crossing Jordan

NOEL HOLSTON

The Grassy Noel

TVWW ARCHIVE

Contributors Archive
 
 
2013
May
30
BIRD By David Bianculli
 
 
Part of tonight's TCM salute to Clint Eastwood as a director, this 1988 film stars Forest Whitaker as the hard-living, hard-playing saxophone player Charlie Parker. Samuel E. Wright is featured, too, as Dizzy Gillespie.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
30
A 'FRESH PRINCE' REUNION By Christy Slewinski
 
 
Will Smith orchestrates a mini-Fresh Prince reunion on BBC America's The Graham Norton Show...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
29
INSIDE THE ACTORS STUDIO By David Bianculli
 
 
On tonight’s new, two-hour edition, host James Lipton celebrates his 250th show, and does so by inviting several guests for interviews in front of his students – guests who include Silver Linings Playbook co-stars Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro, Conan O’Brien, and Hugh Jackman. The 250 show mark is significant: Given Lipton’s penchant for asking the same questions to end each interviews, that’s a lot of “favorite swear words” on the record for posteri
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
29
TRAFFIC By David Bianculli
 
 
Sometime, during the filming of this 2000 movie remake of the miniseries Traffik, director Steven Soderbergh asked star Michael Douglas if he had ever thought of playing Liberace, and Douglas, who hadn’t, offered up an instant impression. Thirteen years later, the two collaborated on last weekend’s HBO biography of Liberace, Behind the Candelabra. So by getting stuck in Traffic tonight, you also can enjoy an earlier collaboration by these two maverick moviemakers.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
29
THE AMERICAN BAKING COMPETITION By David Bianculli
 
 
SERIES PREMIERE: This new CBS series, which takes 10 amateur chefs and has them compete each week in three contests to assess their abilities as amateur bakers, is based on a hot series from the U.K. – so don’t dismiss it out of hand. Cooking-show imports, either adapted or  acquired wholesale, include one of my all-time faves, the original Japanese Iron Chef. And The American Baking Competition is hosted, in this incarnation, by Jeff Foxworthy, who’s proven himself quite
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
29
JAILHOUSE ROCK By David Bianculli
 
 
This 1957 Elvis Presley movie includes the title production number, which stands alone as one of the best pre-MTV music “videos” ever made. Going to a party at the county jail…
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
29
NOVA: "MANHUNT -- BOSTON BOMBERS" By David Bianculli
 
 
Nova has been doing more and more of these “instant specials,” keyed to recent news events, and it’s a very smart move. Finding ways to explore the science behind headlines is a way in to stories about floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, blackouts – and, in this case, federal investigations of recent crimes. The April 15 bombing of the Boston Marathon is examined in tonight’s episode, showing in detail how investigators used some modern tools, and discarded others, to is
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
28
MAD MEN: THE TWIN WITHIN By Eric Gould
 
 
Mad Men has always explored the lurking subconscious within, and the last couple of weeks have been a Freudian romp...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
28
THE VOICE By David Bianculli
 
 
I watched chunks of last night’s Top 8 performance evening – but the overly produced staging of some of the numbers, a sort of X Factor overkill, turned me off, so I did the same to my TV set. Oh, well, at least I can catch up on what I missed by watching tonight’s overextended results show.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2013
May
28
CONSTITUTION USA WITH PETER SAGAL By David Bianculli
 
 
SERIES FINALE: In “Built to Last,” host Peter Sagal examines the longevity of the U.S. Constitution by exploring how difficult it is to amend it, and how resilient it is in the face of extreme challenges to it. For this final episode in his painlessly informative documentary series, Sagal visits both Iceland, where that country’s leaders recently used the U.S. Constitution as a model to rewrite their own, and the history of Watergate. Only one of those locations, though, can be
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'
By Ed Bark
 
 
 
 
Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver
By Christy Slewinski
 
 
 
 
'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy
By Noel Holston
 
 
 
 

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James
By Mike Hughes
 
 
 
 
For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self
By Monique Nazareth
 
 
 
 
Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption
By David Hinckley