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January 2008 Archives
January 31, 2008 - How Will Viewers Find "Lost" - If They Do?
January 31, 2008 2:12 AM
The fourth season of ABC's Lost begins - finally - tonight at 9 ET, eight months after the previous first-run episode. It's a strong season premiere, introducing new characters, dilemmas and mysteries, but the biggest question of all regarding Lost is this: Now that ABC has built it, who will come?
By the time the previous Writers Guild of America strike ended, overall TV viewership fell about 10 percent, and never recovered. Now that the current strike is about to enter its fourth month, signs are everywhere suggesting viewer fatigue - or worse, viewer apathy.
Last week's double helping of fresh episodes of Chuck on NBC? Good episodes, but even against Thursday reruns of Grey's Anatomy and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, their audience levels were series lows. The strike-finale episodes of Criminal Minds and CSI: NY last Wednesday? Set or tied season lows. ABC's fresh Ugly Betty? Except for holidays, another season low.
In other words, just being fresh isn't enough. The return of Lost is the biggest series event of the February ratings sweeps - so if it can't draw as many viewers as it did for its season premiere (or, at least, its season average) last season, it's a strong indication that this strike already may have had a draining effect on viewership.
What's Lost, at this point, may be more than just a TV show.
As for the show itself: ABC is asking for such a veil of secrecy, critics are requested not to discuss plot details of things revealed even before the opening credits. That's really pushing it: What happens in the opening minute of a show ought to be considered fair game for a review.
But I'll behave, for now. It's fair to say that we see more of the flash-forwards that stunned us in last season's finale, and learn that Kate and Jack were not the only ones to make it off the island. We learn, in fact, the identity of another, as well as the total number of those who returned.
We also spend time in the present, as the would-be rescuers - the ones, Charlie warned in his handwritten final act, from "not Penny's boat" - get closer to the island, and the survivors. The show, in short, is a reminder of how much fun a thought-provoking fantasy series can be.
If, that is, people bother to tune in to watch. Right now, that's as big a mystery as anything involving black smoke, polar bears or vanishing cabins.
January 30, 2008 - The February Ratings Sweeps Start Tomorrow - Barely
January 30, 2008 9:41 AM
Tomorrow, January 31, is the start of the February ratings sweeps, one of those months set aside, in a increasingly archaic practice, to use ratings results to establish future advertising rates. This year, the February sweeps end on February 27 , leaving the last two days (it's a Leap Year) out of the running.
One thing's for sure: You can't accuse the networks of saving the best for last. The most eagerly anticipated event of the February sweeps arrives the very first day - tomorrow, when it's still January, and when ABC presents the season premiere of Lost.
It's a fitting parallel to this entire strike-bitten TV season: Most of the good stuff appeared right out of the gate, and as time wears on, the offerings get thinner.
Three networks claim one annual special event each this February: Fox has the Super Bowl, ABC has the Oscars (in whatever shape it finally arrives), and CBS has the Grammys. NBC's probable biggest event of the month? A telemovie remake, and backdoor pilot, of Knight Rider. No, I'm not KITT-ing.
The good scripted stuff? It's rare, but it exists. CBS presents a slightly toned-down, but still commendable and recommendable, version of the first season of Showtime's serial-killer drama series, Dexter. The PBS Masterpiece anthology series continues its Jane Austen tribute with Miss Austen Regrets and Pride and Prejudice, and NBC imports the excellent Internet series Quarterlife.
Any remaining new episodes of existing drama series and sitcoms will surface in February, including a fresh post-Super Bowl episode of House, season premieres of Jericho and The New Adventures of Old Christine, and scattered episodes of Brothers & Sisters, Friday Night Lights, and Smallville. I know I haven't mentioned Lipstick Jungle yet - but that's because, on a list of entertaining scripted series, it simply doesn't belong.
Some sweeps offerings can sweep you away, but others ought to be swept under a rug.
January 29, 2008 - Day 87: American TV Held Hostage
January 29, 2008 1:05 AM
We're closing in on the start of the fourth month of the Writers Guild of America strike - 87 days so far, and counting, in which TV has done without most of its writers, and viewers are having to do without much of their regular television fare. But with the Oscars only 26 days away, there's reason to hope that an end to the strike really is in sight.
Or, at least, that the light at the end of the tunnel isn't just fire from the latest negotiation-table train wreck.
Both sides, at this point, agree on one overriding point: No one, right now, wants to stop the Academy Awards from being televised in its usual form. Not the actors, who thus far have been the writers' most powerful and visible ally. Not the studios, which would lose scores of millions in promotional opportunities for their films. Certainly not ABC, which owns the broadcast rights and sells the advertising time.
And not even the writers, who don't want to alienate the actors. The WGA could give the Oscars an interim agreement and call off the WGA picket lines, as with Sunday's Screen Actors Guild awards and the Feb. 10 Grammy Awards - but this is the time to negotiate with leverage, and both sides, for a change, are both talking and listening.
My sources in Los Angeles, who throughout this strike have seldom been in agreement about any predictions regarding its conclusion, now say pretty much the same thing. Either the strike will be settled in the next two weeks - before the Grammys, basically - or it's going to be lengthy, and ugly, and potentially crushing. The worse the economy gets, the nastier things are likely to get, on both sides.
But for now, at least one bright spot is on the immediate TV horizon. In two days, ABC presents the season premiere of Lost.
The episode, based on the promos, suggests the promise of rescue and the threat of false hope. Let's hope it's not an analogy that extends to the current TV writers' strike. This particular island - a desperate, lonely place populated by Dance War and American Gladiators - is one from which we viewers would all love to escape.
Vote us off... please.
January 28, 2008 - Diving Into "In Treatment," And Loving It
January 28, 2008 2:10 AM
I'm presenting a full review of HBO's new In Treatment series on today's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, so I won't repeat myself here. Instead, I'll do more of a bloggy thing, and talk about how, and how completely, this innovative new series got me hooked.
The format, taken from an Israeli series that became a big hit over there, is more of a miniseries in scope, but played out with the frequency of a daytime soap opera. It's about a therapist played by Gabriel Byrne, who sees four different patients - one each on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. On Friday, he visits his own therapist. That weekly schedule continues for nine straight weeks, as we learn more about the patients, the therapist, and their relationships together.
It's a crazy thing, in this day and age, to ask viewers to commit to. But between HBO's schedule of repeats, and online and on-demand availability, catching up is easier than ever. And In Treatment rewards that commitment, almost exponentially. The more you watch, the better it gets.
Monday is Laura (played by Melissa George), who has a crush on Byrne's therapist Paul. Tuesday is Alex (Blair Underwood), a bomber pilot back from Iraq. Wednesday is Sophie (Mia Wasikowska), a teen gymnast with two broken arms. Thursday is a couples therapy session with Jake (Josh Charles) and Amy (Embeth Davidtz), who aren't getting along. And on Friday, Paul sees Gina (Dianne Wiest), a therapist with her own issues. There's also Michelle Forbes as Paul's wife, Kate.
HBO sent out the first four weeks' worth of shows for review - more than enough to see how things unfold. These are like little one-act plays, or verbal ballets. And each week, almost each show, brings a surprise: revelation, flirtation, confrontation. The acting gets stronger, the writing more fluid, the characters more fully rounded and intriguing.
But here's the kicker. Just before writing my reviews, HBO sent weeks five through seven. I didn't have to watch them, but, being anal about such things, I would have - yet this time, I couldn't wait to see them. It wasn't duty, it was pleasure.
And when a TV show crosses over into my "pleasure" zone, that's when I know it's something special. In Treatment is precisely that.
January 26, 2008 - Still Easier Than Rolling Off a Blog
January 25, 2008 11:33 PM
By mere coincidence, the writers' strike and TV WORTH WATCHING began the exact same day, on November 5. For more than a month, I wrote every single day - and every single day, they didn't. Beginning December 15, I decided to stop writing new blogs on weekends.
I'll continue to write daily, providing BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS. But the seven-day-a-week column/blog pace is killing me, so instead of supplying a new blog on weekends, I'll post my favorite test pattern instead.
Enjoy your weekend. I plan to.
January 25, 2008 - Fox and P.T. Barnum Agree Again... For Now
January 25, 2008 1:13 AM
Legendary circus showman P.T. Barnum once reportedly insisted, "You'll never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public."
In a related story (as Conan O'Brien might set up the segue), the Fox series Moment of Truth drew huge numbers in its prime-time debut Wednesday.
How huge? It retained 94 percent of its American Idol lead-in, that's how huge. It drew an estimated 23.2 million viewers, that's how huge - easily beating The Sarah Chronicles as the highest-rated series premiere of the season. Apparently, people asking "How low can TV go?" were willing to turn to Fox in search of an answer.
My guess, and my hope, is that this novelty will fade rather quickly. Joe Millionaire was hot, too, for a while - and you don't have to watch Moment of Truth too long to realize how empty it is. And how essentially, inescapably repugnant.
"Is there an honest person left in America?" asks host Mark L. Walberg (not the actor Mark Walhberg, who's talented). Then this host, like a prime-time Diogenes, sets out in search of truth... by asking contestants to respond to increasingly embarrassing true or false questions, as their spouses, friends and/or loved ones sit nearby and cringe.
The gimmick is that all these questions, and more, already have been asked of the contestants previously, as part of a lie detector test. So the reality is, even though viewers don't know what's coming, the contestant sure does.
Then there's the problem of empathy. On Wednesday's premiere, for example, one of the contestants was asked, "Have you ever hit someone else's car and not left a note?" He admitted that he had - several times! - and when his "Yes" answer matched his previous lie-detector reply, the studio audience applauded.
Why? Because he came one step closer to winning some money? Or because he's such a jerk? And after a few replies like that, does the audience start rooting for the contestant to fail?
I sure did. But my dreams are bigger. I'm rooting for the whole show to fail.
Based on the ratings for the premiere, it's got a long, long way to fall - but I have faith. Faith in the short shelf life of novelty items, faith in the belief that bad reality shows eventually seep to their own barrel-bottom levels - and faith, in the end, in the intelligence of the American public.
Fool us once, shame on Fox. Fool us too often, though, and the blame will have to shift.
January 24, 2008 - One Month to the Oscars, and Counting - Quickly
January 24, 2008 12:48 AM
One month from today, the Academy Awards are scheduled to be presented on ABC. Because of the ongoing strike by the Writers Guild of America, and the refusal to cross picket lines by most members of the Screen Actors Guild, that globally popular and profitable awards show is very much at risk this year.
Which, in turn, makes it the single best hope that the strike, just 12 days away from going into its fourth month, will be resolved sooner rather than later. The Golden Globes were a joke, and no big loss at all, but the Oscars, worldwide, are very serious business.
The battle lines, drawn months ago, have advanced to the point where the opposing fronts are staring at each other, eyeball to eyeball. Now it's time for somebody to blink, or most likely we'll all have to wait for June or beyond for a resolution.
The writers flexed their muscles by holding firm and picketing the Golden Globes. The actors sided with the writers, and NBC, trying to prove something, presented a winners-announcement prime-time special that was a national laughing stock.
Since then, the writers have shown some flexibility, giving special dispensation to the CBS telecast of the Feb. 10 Grammy Awards so the show could go on - and celebrate a truly special 50th anniversary. The Directors Guild of America has settled with the studio consortium, but that doesn't sway most members of the WGA, because they feel burned having accepted what the directors settled for, regarding home-video compensation percentages, way back during the last strike 20 years ago.
Both the writers and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, though, have announced a new willingness to resume informal talks - six weeks after the previous, formal talks broke off. Writers also have discussed a willingness to back off from pushing for reality and animation writers to be admitted to the WGA, so there may be a hope of movement at last.
The biggest hope, though, is that George Clooney was quoted this week saying flatly that without an agreement or a settlement, no actors he knew would cross a picket line to attend the Oscars. Clooney carries a huge amount of weight in Hollywood, and he's just thrown it behind the writers. If the WGA doesn't blink first, the studios should. The lineup of Oscar nominees announced Tuesday is devoid of blockbusters, so the studios presenting them need all the promotion they can get.
It's foolish to be optimistic at this point, but at least there's a chance. It's in the AMPTP's financial interest to settle things in time for the Oscars to proceed... and now that the Grammys are a go, everyone involved can focus their eyes on the Oscar prize.
January 23, 2008 - Ringo Stars on TV, And Saves the Best for Latest
January 23, 2008 10:06 AM
Ringo Starr, promoting his first all-new CD in decades, has returned to the Ed Sullivan Theater, the site of his live American TV debut on The Ed Sullivan Show 44 years ago, and performed on Late Show with David Letterman. Dave saved Ringo for last, walked over and chatted with him for a few moments after the former Beatle and his band performed "Liverpool 8," and that was that.
Nice, but too brief.
Yesterday, Ringo was supposed to perform on Live! With Regis and Kelly, but reported disputes over the lengths of musical and interview segments led to Ringo passing at the last minute. He did show up on Rachael Ray, but I didn't watch that. No interest.
But the appearance Ringo and his band are making tomorrow night on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, another CBS talk show that, like the earlier Late Show, is owned by David Letterman, sounds too good to miss. In fact, I'm flying across the country just to see it taped.
After Ferguson's monologue and email segment, the rest of the 60-minute Late Late Show is devoted to an interview with, and music by, Ringo Starr. Performing a four-minute song, which was part of the issue on Live!, won't be any problem here. In fact, Ringo and his band are scheduled to perform four songs.
One, "Liverpool 8," is the bouncy, nostalgic leadoff song from his new CD. Two others are from the era of The Beatles: "Boys" (Ringo's hair-shaking cover version of a song recorded originally by The Shirelles) and Ringo's signature tune, "With a Little Help from My Friends."
The fourth song performed tomorrow night at 12:35 a.m. ET, from Ringo's eponymous solo album, is "Photograph," a song he co-wrote with George Harrison. Its lyrics are even more poignant now, and it's something I can't wait to see.
It should make for great TV, and I'm really looking forward to how Ferguson handles the interview. Most of all, though, I want to try to peek in on rehearsals, and maybe get a chance to say hello and thanks, without betraying how huge a fan I am.
But if you click to the FRESH AIR website and listen to my Sgt. Pepper anniversary salute, you know the odds of my handling myself with dignity are fairly slim. But wish me luck, just the same.
January 22, 2008 - "Moment of Truth" for Network TV?
January 22, 2008 1:20 AM
The Fox network, which in the past has presented such reprehensible unscripted TV as Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?, The Littlest Groom, When Animals Attack and so many others, tomorrow night at presents another new series sure to attract headlines - and, most likely, lots of viewers. It's Moment of Truth... in more ways than one.
Fox sent out only snippets for preview, and is counting on the show's American Idol lead-in, audacious promos and train-wreck premise to lure viewers instead. It's a trick that has worked for Fox before, and most probably will again. When the premise of the show is, in essence, a Newlywed Game with lie detectors, asking contestants embarrassing questions they're required to answer "truthfully," what can come of it other than coast-to-coast embarrassment?
Fox used to be known primarily for this type of bottom-feeding high-concept stuff. (That's in concept, since I haven't seen the full show. Despite the promos, it could be a warm family show with uplifting messages and high entertainment values. Whoops, better duck! Watch out for that flying pig!)
But these days, when you think of Fox, you're most likely to think of American Idol, House, 24, The Simpsons - pretty good stuff, overall. Fox even has given us Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, the one scripted series this season that looks to have caught on big with viewers.
Elsewhere, though, what are we getting? NBC is proud of its American Gladiators circus, and next month will present Baby Borrowers, a reality show that might make Kid Nation look like a responsible programming experiment. CBS is polluting its airwaves with another Big Brother, this time in the middle of a TV season rather than the summer and ABC - well, Dance War: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann about says it all.
These network heads actually think they're performing well and intelligently, during the writers' strike, by filling hours with programs that are a) not generated by members of the Writers Guild of America, b) cheaper to make than scripted dramas and sitcoms, and c) often draw higher ratings in the time slots than the scripted shows they're replacing.
And yes, short term, that all makes sense, as well as dollars. But no one on the network side appears to be looking at the long-term impact of introducing such tacky trash into the prime-time network bloodstream. How is a network devalued when some of the stuff it's presenting is no better or less demeaning than a Flavor of Love on VH1?
They're not asking that question. But I am... and this year, in the midst of the strike, may turn out, in hindsight, to have been the Moment of Truth.
January 21, 2008 - Forget the Talk Show Wars - It's Time for an Official Late-Night Feud
January 20, 2008 11:47 PM
The writers' strike has made late-night TV more interesting to watch these days than prime time. Most talk shows have found increasingly inventive, or bizarre, ways to fill time without marquee guests - while David Letterman and Craig Ferguson, whose special agreement with the Writers Guild of America allows actors to visit without facing picket lines, have begun to stack their decks with big names.
Letterman was positively piling on last week when he had Sylvester Stallone as one guest, on the same night Bruce Willis sat in with Paul Shaffer and the band. Letterman may as well have been taunting his competition by shouting: "Look, ma, no strike!" - and tonight on Late Show, he plays host to a former Beatle, Ringo Starr. (Ferguson, on his , is happy to employ the same strategy, even with some of the same guests: Stallone appears on his show tonight, with an all-Starr show set for Thursday.)
The other hosts, and shows, are doing what they can. Jay Leno, who has generated his monologue single-handedly (to the chagrin of WGA officials) for almost three weeks now, has stretched his behind-the-desk minutes by presenting and ridiculing items purchased at a local 99-cent store - seemingly every item in the inventory. ABC's Jimmy Kimmel shows TV clips whenever he can to eat up some time, and Conan shows his own clips, repeating footage from previous days' "highlights." He's also assembled a cardboard maze through which guests must pass befoe making their way to his desk.
Recently, though, O'Brien may have stumbled upon a late-night, time-eating gold mine. (No, I'm not talking about his zip-line antics, though the stop-Lincoln's-assassination enactment gets high marks for surrealistic silliness.) After both O'Brien and Stephen Colbert claimed to have "made" Mike Huckabee, Colbert used The Colbert Report to refute O'Brien's claim and address his directly Thursday, threatening "to kick your translucent white ass!" - adding, "You got that, Irish?"
O'Brien, on Friday, replied by defending himself ("My ass is not translucent; it's chalky white with streaks of pink") and ridiculing Colbert's French heritage, donning a beret and moustache, holding a loaf of French bread and pretending to pedal a bicycle in front of from a green-screen shot of the Eiffel tower. Pure silliness - but also, potentially, pure brilliance.
Kimmel and Leno appeared on each other's shows - partly in a show of mutual support, partly to eat up as many minutes as possible - but that's a crossover stunt that can be done only once, or rarely. A feud, with two funny men firing jokes at each other in an ongoing battle, is a comedy well that can draw headlines, consume hours of air time, and never run dry.
Fred Allen and Jack Benny, good friends in real life, started a similar feudon radio in 1937. It lasted more than 10 years.
Surely, a TV equivalent, if handled and fed properly, could last at least as long as the strike. Conan vs. Colbert... take your corners!
January 19, 2008 - Still Easier Than Rolling Off a Blog
January 19, 2008 2:44 AM
By mere coincidence, the writers' strike and TV WORTH WATCHING began the exact same day, on November 5. For more than a month, I wrote every single day - and every single day, they didn't. Beginning December 15, I decided to stop writing new blogs on weekends.
I'll continue to write daily, providing BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS. But the seven-day-a-week column/blog pace is killing me, so instead of supplying a new blog on weekends, I'll post my favorite test pattern instead.
Enjoy your weekend. I plan to.
January 18, 2008 - AMC Follows "Mad Men" With Another Bold Series
January 18, 2008 2:31 AM
I suspect, when I describe AMC's new Breaking Bad series to you, the description alone won't make you eager to see it - because it didn't make me eager to see it. Having watched three episodes, though, all I can do is beg you to give the new series, premiering Sunday night at 10 p.m. ET, a chance.
Here's the bad news: the cold summary. Bryan Cranston, the henpecked husband from Malcolm in the Middle, stars as Walter White, a high-school chemistry teacher in the midst of what might be mistaken for a midlife crisis. He's turning 50, behind on the bills, his teen son has celebral palsy, and his wife is pregnant.
Except that this crisis isn't coming at midlife, because before too long, Walter is diagnosed as having inoperable lung cancer, and a prognosis of two years to live, at best. So what does he do? He sets out to put his chemistry knowledge to good use, and build a nest egg for his family, by starting a crystal meth lab.
Doesn't sound like your cup of tea, hallucinogenic or otherwise? Mine, either. But Vince Gilligan, the X-Files writer-producer who created this series, stacks the deck against Walter so heavily that even his plan to go bad goes wrong - and he ends up embroiled in a deadly confrontation with rival drug dealers.
It may all sound too much like Showtime's Weeds, but this Gilligan's island is an isolated pressure cooker of consequences. Gilligan paints Walter into an awful corner, then keeps adding more coats of paint. In the next two episodes, Walter's still dealing, not too well, with the ramifications of what he's tried to do... and, by the end, you really feel for the guy.
Breaking Bad is a lot funnier than I've made it sound, and a lot more entertaining that a thumbnail summary makes it sound. Like Walter in his makeshift meth lab, Gilligan is enough of an artist to be cooking up something special here. For those viewers who found AMC when it launched Mad Men last year, welcome to the second half of the one-two punch. With these two series and the Broken Trail miniseries, AMC is making its presence known quickly... and impressively.
January 17, 2008 - What's On, and Gone, On TV's Late-Night Shows
January 17, 2008 1:01 AM
I'm tired. Tired of watching all the late-night shows, night after night, to see who's doing what, not doing what, and how various shows are faring with or without writers. Two weeks after the returns of Jay, Dave, Conan and Craig, there still are a lot of surprises, a lot of shifting... and a lot that's missing.
Monday and Tuesday night on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman, David Letterman promised a Top 10 list, then failed to deliver one either night. Presumably, the segments were cut because the chats with guests - especially Don Rickles and Denzel Washington at the same time - were strong, and ran long. But still, since Letterman fought so hard to return with his writers, why cut their biggest nightly showcase?
Also missed: On last Friday's return installment of HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher ended his show by not doing his trademark closing "New Rules." Again, there's a "presumably" attached - that Maher didn't write it himself out of deference to, and solidarity with, his writing staff, which was not able to return.
Maher's first show back was a little flat, but tomorrow will be his second try. When Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert came back last week, their first shows were strong, but their second shows were weak. Then they started to rebound - and, like everyone else, had ups and downs depending on guests, comedy, even audiences.
The Jimmy Kimmel-Jay Leno crossover was good for both shows. On The Tonight Show, Leno even replayed an old Jimmy Kimmel Live sketch in which Kimmel impersonated Leno - quite well, and a little harshly.
Also good: Letterman's counterpunch that same night. While NBC has Leno-Kimmel and ABC had Kimmel-Leno live, CBS had Letterman and Howard Stern, always a potent combo. And Stern, like Katie Holmes earlier this week, kept things interesting by asking questions as much as answering them, and getting Letterman to talk about fatherhood, and life outside of the show.
Another Late Show treat: Having Chris Elliott come in from the cold - of the picket line - to visit with his old friend from NBC's Late Night with David Letterman days.
Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - because its guests, like Letterman's, don't have to worry about crossing picket lines - has upped its star wattage slightly the last two weeks, and next week's guests, including Sylvester Stallone, continue the trend.
Ferguson's as loose as ever - maybe setting new levels for looseness - and that brings out unexpected things in his guests as well. I can't imagine that Val Kilmer planned, when talking about his Ponderosa-type ranch spread, to pull out his phone and display a cell phone photo of the river running through it. But it made for a moment of television that felt like eavesdropping on a casual, private conversation - and, in terms of a melding of new technologies, may have set a late-night TV precedent.
January 16, 2008 - "American Idol" Up to Its Old Tricks - and Why Not?
January 16, 2008 1:05 AM
Last night's two-hour season premiere of American Idol, summarizing the initial audition days from Philadelphia, pulled all the old tricks for which the mega-popular Fox competition series is famous. And really, to do otherwise would have been foolish.
There were the contestants who got through to the initial judges' round purely to be laughed at. These included ranged the guy nicknamed Yuka, who talked and sounded like a road-company Borat and performed the "Mr. Bee Gees" song, "How Deep Is Your Life." And the guy who described his voice as reminiscent of both Paul Robeson and Eddie Vedder, and whose version of "Go Down Moses" had Paula Abdul and Randy Jackson hiding their faces while laughing loudly (and rudely).
There was a Star Wars fan who dressed like Princess Leia - a female fan, thanks goodness, because another Leia wannabe was male - whose meek geek demeanor transmogrified to rank anger once she was rejected. Ditto for Alexis, a young woman so furious when her Grace Slick-ish "Somebody to Love" performance was rejected that she proclaimed, "I'm going for actressing!"
These are the types of moments, and misguided contestants, that made last year's earliest rounds of American Idol the most popular installments of the season - more so even than the finals. Think of that. More viewers tuned in to see the earliest losers than the eventual winner. That says something, either about the quality of 2007's finalists or the perverse nature of American TV viewers.
Probably, it's a little of both.
While I laugh at some of the rank amateurs - the ones who really are rank - I actually prefer these early shows to see the first sparkles of raw talent. Last night, that would include Kristy Lee Cook, who sold a horse to travel from Oregon to compete in Philly. She and her voice were equally pleasant, especially after a diet of Princess Leias.
But in these early rounds, especially, when Ran Seacrest is offering encouragement and solace to contestants, hugging and smiling and commiserating, my mind always wanders back to Brian Dunkelman. He co-hosted season one of Idol with Seacrest, then was gone before season two, when the show exploded. In TV SAT terms, Brian Dunkelman is to American Idol as Pete Best is to The Beatles.
And at the end of this season, American Idol will have been making TV longer than The Beatles made records. Hard to imagine, harder to accept - but there it is...
January 15, 2008 - While Others are Idle, Fox Has "Idol"
January 15, 2008 12:56 AM
Strike or no strike, it starts again tonight - just when, and how it was planning to come back all along. Yes, America Idol is back, and Fox has got it, at 8 p.m. ET And with it, Fox has the momentum to ride out the rest of this season, no matter what happens.
Last year, Idol suffered a bit from a relative paucity of charismatic finalists, and ended up losing a percentage of its audience. But that was in season six, and the program remains so popular, it could keep losing viewers annually at those levels and still retain the top spot among weekly series until at least the next decade.
Against a strike-weakened schedule, Idol is poised this year not only to rebound, but to soar even higher. A lot, as always, will depend upon the talent that's dredged up, and how voting viewers respond to the various contestants. Last year, nothing was as memorable as Sanjaya's hair. This year, with luck, it'll be someone's voice.
But even if American Idol disappoints at the finish line, it keeps most viewers interested in the journey anyway, because it isn't just one compelling show. It's three.
The first act of the three-act Idol format is the Best-and-Worst initial audition process. The fun here is in seeking out raw talent, and cringing at the even rawer lack of talent.
Act two? The group competition auditions, where everyone's supposed to be good, but where personality and poise count as much as talent. This year, contestants at this level are given a second chance - increasing the chances that some golden voices won't be eliminated by a single nervous stumble.
Act three? The Top 24, then Top 12, then the march to the winner's circle. This is where the performances get longer and more important, the stakes higher, the range and possibility more obvious.
And the one constant in all three? Simon Cowell, who's just as entertaining skewering the talentless as bolstering the egos of the talented. Randy Jackson is supportive, and Paula Abdul's a cartoonish loose cannon - but Simon, in a judge's competition of Idol, would wins hands down. Or thumbs up.
January 14, 2008 - NBC's "Golden Globe Winners Special" a Real Loser
January 14, 2008 12:46 AM
NBC, annoyed that solidarity by actors honoring the Writers Guild of America picket line ended up canceling yesterday's Golden Globes ceremony, devoted an hour of Sunday's prime time to the announcement of the winners anyway. It was an embarrassingly low-rent, inexcusable, unwatchable waste of air time.
And in that spirit, it was the first part of a bottom-of-the-barrel doubleheader. Immediately following it on the Peacock Network: another installment of the I-Can't-Believe-It's-Not-Cable debacle, American Gladiators. If this keeps up, and it just might, NBC should change its corporate emblem from the Peacock to the Skunk.
The hosts of yesterday's Golden Globe Winners Special (it wasn't even titled as the plural, more common Globes) were Billy Bush and Nancy O'Dell. They stood at the same podium and, for an hour, read the nominees, waited for the film clips to eat up a few seconds each, announced the winner, and briefly gave their respective two cents' worth.
Another four cents, apparently, was reserved for the set, which looked as tacky as the rest of this shallow unnecessary enterprise seemed. Once the ceremony itself was cancelled, viewers were denied the only arguable reason to tune in: to watch TV and movie stars intermingle while imbibing alcohol.
As awards of artistic merit go, these Hollywood Foreign Press Awards are about as meaningful as the Marvel Comics No-Prizes that Stan Lee used to hand out, but only in spirit, to readers. (Maybe he still does.) Take away the party, and these awards, recent additions to TV's annual schedule of specials anyway, are - and, last night, were - totally unnecessary. Post the winners on the web and be done with it.
Except, of course, that NBC didn't want to sacrifice the advertising revenue entirely, and didn't like losing in a game of chicken with the actors and writers. Get used to it, networks. And while CBS may have it easier figuring a way to present the Grammys on Feb. 10, ABC's presentation of the Academy Awards two weeks later is the next big battleground.
And that globally viewed, phenomenally popular battleground is really, really big, since ABC's projected ad revenues for the Oscars are some $110 million - nearly 10 times what NBC risked losing with the Globes. The Oscars are only six weeks away. If anything is going to prevent the strike from running into and past June, that's probably it.
Otherwise, people across the country, and the world, will have to think about draining their Oscar pools.
January 12, 2008 - Still Easier Than Rolling Off a Blog
January 12, 2008 2:26 PM
By mere coincidence, the writers' strike and TV WORTH WATCHING began the exact same day, on November 5. For more than a month, I wrote every single day - and every single day, they didn't. Beginning December 15, I decided to stop writing new blogs on weekends.
I'll continue to write daily, providing BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS. But the seven-day-a-week column/blog pace is killing me, so instead of supplying a new blog on weekends, I'll post my favorite test pattern instead.
Enjoy your weekend. I plan to.
January 11, 2008 - Three Sunday TV Offerings Chase Past Glories... At Various Speeds
January 11, 2008 11:54 AM
Three programs, on three different networks, are televised Sunday night, each aiming to recapture past glories or wide the waves of past successes. Each has moments of interest, but only one truly succeeds.
The three Sunday offerings? On Fox at 8 p.m. ET, there's Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, a weekly amplification of the Terminator movie series. On CBS at 9 p.m. ET, there's the start of Comanche Moon, a prequel to the classic Western Lonesome Dove miniseries. And on PBS, also at 9 p.m. ET (check local listings), there's Persuasion, the start of a "Complete Jane Austen" cycle on Masterpiece, the venerable PBS anthology series formerly known as Masterpiece Theatre.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles ought to succeed on Fox, because - based on the first two episodes, at least - it's loaded with images and action sequences that work well in network promos. As for the story, it's a little murky, and neither as tense nor as funny as its theatrical predecessors - at least not the first two, the ones directed by James Cameron.
It's no accident that a new character - a young female terminator who's sent back in time to protect Sarah and her son, the future savior of mankind - is named Cameron, as an obvious salute. What is an accident, probably, is that Cameron, played by Summer Glau from Joss Whedon's Firefly, steals the show, and easily is the most interesting character in the TV series.
Lena Headey and Thomas Dekker, as mother and son, are good enough, especially Headey, but it's Glau, impersonating a machine impersonating a woman, who has the most fun here, and imparts that enjoyment to viewers. If you watch and decide to stick around, she's the main reason why. Otherwise, there's a lot to forgive, and forget.
Comanche Moon, compared to Lonesome Dove, is a disappointingly obvious and clunky prequel, but it's not without its pleasures. Robert Duvall was so brilliant as Gus McCrae in the original, it's hard to imagine anyone daring to step into his shoes - but Steve Zahn does a really fine job, and absolutely nails Duvall's accent and delivery. Karl Urban, impersonating Tommy Lee Jones' Woodrow Call, takes a little longer to take root, but eventally manages.)
The joys of this Western come courtesy of Val Kilmer, playing a Texas Ranger so eccentric as to be absolutely endearing. The usually charming Rachel Griffiths, though, can't do anything with the overwritten role of his wife, which, like many scenes in this six-hour miniseries, feel more acted than real. A lot more.
Finally, there's Masterpiece, beginning with a stretch of "Masterpiece Classic" dramatizations hosted by Gillian Anderson. Persuasion, adapted by Simon Burke, starts this "Complete Jane Austen" cycle. Sally Hawkins stars as Anne Elliot, the 27-year-old "spinster" who gets a second chance at love with the charismatic Captain Wentworth (Rupert Penry-Jones). This is the one Sunday offering that does everything successfully, up to and including making a prelude to a kiss seem like an eternity of tense expectation. And here, too, there's a scene-stealer: Anthony Head, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, as Anne's society-climbing father.
It's the best of the three - but all three are watchable, for their own reasons, and all three, thank goodness, are new... and are written.
January 10, 2008 - Strike News: The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
January 10, 2008 4:24 AM
As the writers' strike continues, evidence of its reach and impact is more evident every day. There's always news... some of it even good.
GOOD NEWS? The Screen Actors Guild, honoring the picket line of the Writers Guild of America, has caused the cancellation of The Golden Globes as we know them. No big tables with liquored-up celebrities mingling, movie and TV stars alike, shattering the Hollywood caste system for a night of back-slapping and alcohol.
NBC, instead, will televise a live press conference Sunday night at 9 ET, announcing the winners. This presumes, and pretends, that the results of the Globes matter to anyone, or are to be taken at all seriously. Hah. The only reason to watch was to see stars partying live, so losing the Globes, for the sake of the strike, is good news. Now the Oscars, that's another matter... So stay tuned. If you can.
BAD NEWS? Tonight NBC presents fresh episodes of 30 Rock and My Name Is Earl. What's bad about that? They're the last new episodes we're going to see until the strike is over - which means, most likely, they're the last fresh laughs we'll get from these shows for nine months And that's if we're lucky.
UGLY NEWS? But never fear, folks, because just as wonderful scripted shows such as 30 Rock are packing it in for the duration of the strike, new unscripted shows are premiering to give us a taste of what to expect for the next three, six, nine months or more.
Yes, tonight at 10 ET on VH1, you can tune (you shouldn't, but you can) to a new series called Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew. There's so much wrong with just the very existence of this series, especially after a weekend in which the orbits of Britney Spears and Dr. Phil collide, that to say more would be just a soul-sucking waste of energy.
But I will say this, to Brigitte Nielsen, Jeff Conaway and the other quasi-celebrity participants trying to kick drugs, alcohol or other bad behaviors on national TV. The first thing to kick? Your addiction to TV. Heal thyselves, by all means - but do so in private, for your sake as well as ours.
January 09, 2008 - CBS Imports "Dexter" from Showtime - Expect Pressure Groups to Scream Bloody Murder
January 9, 2008 2:52 AM
The news that CBS plans to import and present all 12 episodes of the first season of Showtime's Dexter, beginning February 17, isn't surprising. It's an excellent drama series, CBS is desperately short of inventory, and CBS owns Showtime. What could go wrong?
Glad you asked.
CBS, the network that launched the current era of abject fear of FCC reprisals by presenting Janet Jackson's infamous Super Bowl halftime show, doesn't need to court trouble, especially in an election year - when attacks against sex and violence on TV traditionally reach their zenith.
Yet here CBS is, presenting a prime-time series starring Michael C. Hall as a police crime-scene investigator who secretly is a serial killer - of other serial killers. Yes, it's an edited version, using alternate scenes and substituted dialogue filmed for eventual of-network syndication, but it's still so dark a subject, conservative watchdog groups are bound to have a field day.
They don't even need to see it to denounce it. That's the way they work - and many times, when they see smoke, the media help fan the uproar until there's fire.
My outrage, regarding CBS's scheduling of Dexter, is a little different. I've seen every episode of the series, and loved every minute - but every minute won't be shown by CBS. Not even close.
On Showtime, the average Dexter episode runs very close to a full hour. On CBS, the edited version, according to CBS and Showtime, will run no more than 48 minutes. That's 20 percent less Dexter in every episode. I'm sorry, but that's not serial-killer surgical precision, like Dexter's way with a blade. That's more like the wood-chipper body-disposal method of Fargo.
Millions more viewers will see Dexter on CBS than ever saw it on Showtime. Newcomers won't know what they're missing, and may even like what they see - especially if compared to such home-grown CBS fare as Cane and Moonlight and (shudder) Viva Laughlin. But Dexter was a more complete and mature work of art on Showtime. And CBS, by borrowing wholesale from cable, is sending a message that's ultimately self-defeating.
Thirty years ago, CBS presented a TV spinoff of the movie The Paper Chase, about law students struggling to make it through one grueling term after another. It was an outstanding show, but didn't attract enough viewers. It was so well-regarded, though, that PBS rebroadcast it - and, beginning in 1983, an upstart cable network called Showtime financed a revival of The Paper Chase, producing two new seasons of a former broadcast network series.
That was a little bit of TV history. Now, by presenting a full season of Dexter, CBS is making a little TV history of its own - in reverse. Yes, when the Fox network was young and scrambling for anything that people might watch, it also happily presented cable's hand-me-downs, from Showtime's It's Garry Shandling's Show to HBO's Dream On.
But a major network like CBS, turning over a valuable prime-time slot to a full season of a series seen already on cable, that's new. Good for cable. Good for Showtime. Good for Dexter.
For CBS, not so much.
January 08, 2008 - Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert Are Back - and Are Terrific
January 8, 2008 12:45 AM
What a pleasure it was to have Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert return to TV last night. Both hosts hit just the right tone with everything, right from the start.
Stewart, as always, scribbled wildly on his script as the audience applauded to open the show - except, there being a writers' strike, he had no script, and wrote directly on the desk.
He also made it clear from the start that, without his writers and correspondents and field producers, his show wouldn't be the same. That's why, he announced, that for the duration of the strike, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart henceforth would be known as A Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Nice distinction. Nice call.
Stephen Colbert changed the name of his show, too, in sympathy with the Writers Guild of America strikers. Instead of The Colbert Report, the host explained last night, his Comedy Central program would be known, for the length of the strike, as The Colbert Report. Okay, it may look the same, but he's now pronouncing both words with a hard, rather than silent, "T."
Both comics stayed true to themselves, and their shows, while honoring the no-writers guidelines.
Stewart presented, as his return-night guest, Ron Seeber, professor of labor relations at Cornell University. They discussed strike histories, tactics and negotiations, and the interview, as usual, was both informative and amusing. Colbert's big guest was Richard Freeman of Harvard University - another professor, and another labor specialist. Again, both informative and amusing.
Colbert presented a montage of previous programs in which Mike Huckabee, on three different occasions, offered Colbert a spot on the ticket as his vice president. (The clips, by the way, weren't doctored.) Then he interviewed Andrew Sullivan about Barack Obama - and that interview, big surprise, informed and amused.
Colbert even managed to do what Stewart didn't try, and showed all the Democratic candidates in Saturday's New Hampshire debate talking repeatedly - incessantly, in rapid-fire edited excerpts - about "change."
And in one delightful touch, Colbert's "The WORD," last night, was... nowhere to be found, though Colbert looked for it.
So far as I'm concerned, though, the WORD should be spread: Stewart and Colbert are back. And even without their writers, they've got two of the most entertaining shows on television.
January 07, 2008 - Late-Night Comebacks, Take Two: Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert Return Tonight
January 7, 2008 1:49 AM
It doesn't matter that much, at least not to me, that ABC is launching its Dancing with the Stars spinoff, Dance War: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann, tonight in prime time. What's a lot more interesting, this week no less than last week, is Talk War: Jay vs. Dave, and Everybody Else.
Tonight at 11 p.m. ET on Comedy Central, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart returns, followed at 11:30 ET by Stephen Colbert in The Colbert Report.
Both shows are coming back without their writing staffs, which seems an especially daunting task. That's especially true in Stewart's case, where so much of the show's first-half humor is so tightly structured and dependent upon writing to timely footage and bantering with comic correspondents. But both Stewart and Colbert are first-rate, quick-thinking comedic thinkers, and their perspectives have been sorely missed.
Even their joint statement, issued about their impending return, was amusingly nuanced.
"We would like to return to work with our writers," they said in one voice, disseminated by Comedy Central last week. "If we cannot, we would like to express our ambivalence, but without our writers we are unable to express something as nuanced as ambivalence."
I can't wait, though, for their respective takes on last week's Iowa caucus victories by Republican Mike Huckabee and Democrat Barack Obama. And on last Saturday's double-feature ABC debate in New Hampshire, which featured the Republican candidates, then the Democrats - and in between, had Charles Gibson forcing the political opposites to share the stage for one unprecedented show of bipartisan civility.
It was a great TV moment, the icing between a two-layer cake that was itself pretty palatable, so far as televised debates go. With Saturday's debates as fodder, and the New Hampshire primary literally a day away, Colbert and Stewart, even without writing staffs, should find no lack of inspiration.
But don't forget about the other guys in the late-night talk game, whose moves and fortunes continue to shift daily, and unexpected features can pop up anywhere. Last Friday, in an inspired "look, ma, no writers" time-filler on NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien, O'Brien donned a garish jacket, picked up his guitar, and led his band in an Elvis Presley-paced "Blue Moon of Kentucky." Meanwhile, over on CBS and Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, guest Dominic Monaghan, the actor from Lost, played animal handler for a day and brought out a gecko, some hissing cockroaches, even some snakes. And that show has writers.
Oddly, though the late-night repeats finally are over, we're still getting repeat guests. Bill Maher, who was on Letterman's Late Show last week, popped up on O'Brien on Friday. (His HBO show returns this Friday, presumably without writers - though Conan, like Dave, never asked.) And tonight on Late Show, Letterman's scheduled guests include presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, who last week was seen on both The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Ferguson's Late Show.
But Tom Hanks is supposed to be there, too - and it's doubtful Leno will get any movie star that big to cross the Writers Guild of America picket lines to appear on his show. Huckabee did, last week - but he's a Republican, not a member of the Screen Actors Guild...
January 5, 2008 - Still Easier Than Rolling Off a Blog
January 5, 2008 1:49 AM
By mere coincidence, the writers' strike and TV WORTH WATCHING began the exact same day, on November 5. For more than a month, I wrote every single day - and every single day, they didn't. Beginning December 15, I decided to stop writing new blogs on weekends.
I'll continue to write daily, providing BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS. But the seven-day-a-week column/blog pace is killing me, so instead of supplying a new blog on weekends, I'll post my favorite test pattern instead.
Enjoy your weekend. I plan to.
January 04, 2008 - Getting Down to "The Wire," One Last Time
January 4, 2008 2:54 AM
The final season of HBO's amazing drama series, The Wire, begins Sunday night at 9 ET. It's the weekend's best bet, for sure. I've seen seven of the final 10 hours, and I've done what I can to spread the word that this is the sort of series TV WORTH WATCHING is all about.
On the radio, I reviewed this new season of The Wire for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross - a report you can hear here.
In print, I reviewed it for the Boston Phoenix, in an article you can read here.
So when I've been so excited about The Wire already, and so vocal, what's left for my own blog?
Three things - all of which I wanted to say before, but couldn't find a way to work in.
ONE: Lots of critics have described David Simon's The Wire as Dickensian. He once told me he blamed me, and other critics, for that, joking that every time one of us used the word "Dickensian," it cost him thousands of viewers. (At least I think he was joking.)
But now that the series is ending, and its overall scope is in full view, I think it's less Dickensian than Twainian. Specifically, in terms of the way politicians and police and street-level entrepreneurs all come together, The Wire is very much like a modern equivalent of the Mark Twain-Charles Dudley Warner collaboration The Gilded Age. The drugs of the day (the day being post-Civil war) were silver and mining futures and railroad and territorial expansion, but you'll recognize all the players, at least in spirit.
TWO: I love the opening credits to The Wire, which are a visual montage of images that, at first, don't make much sense. But each week, another image or two is infused with meaning - until, by the end of the season, it all makes sense. Just like the show itself.
THREE: I tried not to take it personally, but when The Wire, in an upcoming episode, laments a cost-cutting newsroom approach that values budget reductions more than experienced reporters, all I can say is: been there, done that, couldn't afford the t-shirt.
Watch The Wire, please. And if you're not up to speed, there are few series more rewarding to watch, one hour after another, on DVD, and the previous four sets all are out there.
January 03, 2008 - Late-Night Impressions, First Night Back
January 3, 2008 2:42 AM
The broadcast network talk shows returned in full force last night - CBS's David Letterman and Craig Fergsuon with writers, and ABC's Jimmy Kimmel and NBC's Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien without them. What, and how, did they do their first nights back?
Late Show with David Letterman, CBS - Letterman had the best and funniest guest of all of them: Robin Williams, who spent the first few minutes of his guest appearance doing riffs on Letterman's strike beard. But a Top 10 list read by striking writers wasn't as funny as it should have been, and a "Get to Know the Staff" segment - presented as a hint of what the show might have looked like without writers - fell pretty flat. Letterman's monologue was good, though, and his rapport with Williams was first-rate.
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, NBC - Leno wrote his own monologue, and said it felt like when he first started out as a standup comic, trying out his own material on his wife. That part of the show went fine, but a Q&A with the audience wasn't as sharp as it might have been. Where Leno shone, somewhat surprisingly, was during his interview segment with Mike Huckabee - who was a lot funnier and more relaxed than might be expected of a presidential candidate the night before the Iowa caucus.
Late Night with Conan O'Brien, NBC - O'Brien's big guest was Bob Saget, who didn't help much. But the host, all by himself, was very funny, and sported his own strike beard. He milked the lack-of-writers situation by doing anything, and everything, to waste time. "That's good water," he said after taking a lengthy sip from his cup. "Killed some time." He got applause, and added, "You can't write a moment like that." Spinning his wedding ring on the desk, goofing with the band, O'Brien made the most with the least last night.
The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, CBS - Like Letterman, Ferguson was able to return with writers, so he opened with a taped skit - one that showed him sporting a comically long beard while serving as a shepherd back in his native Scotland. Then, as he showed up in the studio, the first words of his monologue were a nod to classic talk-show lore: "As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted..." (Except for the "rudely," those were the exact words with which Jack Paar returned to the Tonight show, ending a one-month walkout to protest network censorship.
Oddly, Ferguson made the decision to have no first-night interview guests, filling the hour instead with comedy bits featuring such recurring visitors as Tim Meadows. Meadows and Ferguson always are funny together, and were again tonight, but a big guest, the first night back, would have showcased Ferguson's interview strengths, one of his biggest and most natural assets.
Jimmy Kimmel Live, ABC - On the other hand, sometimes choosing no guest at all is a better move than choosing the wrong guest. Kimmel's big guest his first night back? Two words: Andy Dick.
January 02, 2008 - Ready or Not, Here It Comes: TV's Pseudo-Second Season
January 2, 2008 12:22 AM
Because of the ongoing Writers Guild of America strike, here are a few things we won't be seeing this month that we otherwise would have: the start of a new season of 24 on Fox, the beginning of a second story arc on NBC's Heroes, and two or three months' worth of fresh episodes of most everything else, including such freshman standouts as ABC's Pushing Daisies.
Instead, we're getting the likes of NBC's Law & Order: Criminal Intent, episodes shown last fall on cable. But if you didn't watch them when USA Network first televised them - well, then, to echo NBC's sorry old slogan, they're new to you.
Okay, that comparison's a little harsh. What would have been the second season, effectively beginning tonight, is diluted significantly, but it's not bone dry. Yes, the return this evening of ABC's Wife Swap and Supernanny is cause for more grief than joy, but new episodes of Power of 10 on CBS (8 p.m. ET), with Drew Carey as host, are a pleasant enough diversion, and the season start of NBC's Law & Order, against weak competition, is welcome. Add to that the start of the PBS series Pioneers of Television, and the first-night picture isn't entirely bleak.
To be optimistic for a moment - and a moment is about all I can muster - there are some January prime-time TV offerings still worth anticipating eagerly. HBO's The Wire, which returns Sunday night at 9 ET, is the highlight of the entire month. PBS is devoting the season of Masterpiece Theatre to The Complete Jane Austen. NBC has a lot of episodes stored up of Friday Night Lights, CBS is taking The New Adventures of Old Christine off the shelf, and Fox has another go-round of American Idol.
Those are some of the highlights. But the lights will get dimmer elsewhere, and the inevitable proliferation of nonscripted shows - including the heinous-sounding Fox series Moment of Truth, in which contestants are strapped to lie detectors and asked potentially mortifying personal questions - should sap the spirit as it erodes the broadcast TV audience.
Strap me up to the electrodes and ask me: Am I looking forward to this pseudo-second season? My Moment of Truth says no. I'll do what I can to find and enjoy the best stuff out there - but launching a website called TV WORTH WATCHING, the same day the writers go on strike, now strikes me as a laughably ill-timed coincidence.
January 01, 2008 - Happy New Year, Especially for Late-Night Fans
January 1, 2008 4:10 AM
Just before the close of business yesterday, when everyone was gone or desperate to go to celebrate New Year's Eve, CBS sent out an email announcing David Letterman's Late Show guests for January 2, his return show with writing staff intact. Happy days are here again.
The scheduled guests for tomorrow's Late Show with David Letterman (11:35 p.m. ET), the first non-repeat program since the Writers Guild of America strike began two months ago, are Robin Williams and country artist Shooter Jennings. Bill Maher, actress Ellen Page and the cast of Broadway's Young Frankenstein are scheduled for Thursday, and Donald Trump and hip-hop artist Lupe Fiasco for Friday.
Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, which follows Letterman's program on CBS, also returns tomorrow with an original show, and also benefits from the special interim agreement Letterman's Worldwide Pants production company reached with the WGA. Both series are returning with writing staffs intact, while other late-night talk shows returning tomorrow, ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live and NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, are resuming production without their writers.
Some writers on the picket lines, especially from the movie side of things, are upset that Letterman got to negotiate a separate deal and give his writers paychecks while others continue to sacrifice. Other writers are angry that the NBC and ABC shows are returning to TV without writers.
In this particular corner of the writers' strike, I'm not angry at all. All movies, and most TV shows, can be made later, whenever the strike ends, without much of a dfference in the final product. But topical programs, and late-night talk shows are chief among them, lose golden opportunities for comedy and commentary every single day - opportunities that will never come again. With or without writers, under whatever terms they can negotiate, Leno, Letterman and the rest need to be back on the air. With the Iowa Caucus in two days, it's almost a form of public service.
(That's even more true of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, by the way, and their Comedy Central shows are due to return Monday, sans writers.)
What's going to be interesting to watch, of course, is not only the content of these shows, but the guests booked for each. For two months, ABC's Nightline, the only network show in its time slot not showing reruns, has enjoyed a double-digit increase in audience sampling. Where will viewers go starting tomorrow? And what will they see when they get there?
Letterman and Ferguson should look and feel pretty much the same, with the same caliber and mix of guests and comedy as before. Leno, O'Brien and Kimmel all should do just fine thinking on their feet and joking around, but interviews may not be as focused, comedy skits will be shelved or minimal, and guest rosters may not be as dynamic.
Many actors and directors, whose guilds are in solidarity with the writers and may strike themselves if no settlements are reached by June, refuse to cross WGA picket lines. This gives the shows on CBS a huge advantage.
And where some people have suggested that a solution to that problem is for NBC and ABC to book more authors and Hollywood's few but prominent politically conservative celebrities (Tom Selleck and Patricia Heaton, for example), one late-night producer told me weeks ago that wasn't necessarily the answer. Many authors, apparently, feel strong solidarity with fellow writers, and even Republican celebrities have strong feelings about crossing picket lines.
But the return of all these shows, under whatever constraints, is a good thing - and a good way to start 2008.
Happy New Year.
