April 2009 Archives

GUEST BLOG #13: Diane Holloway Views 'Southland' Via 'Hill Street Blues'

April 30, 2009 7:00 AM

Bianculli here: I couldn't be more thrilled. Today TV WORTH WATCHING welcomes its latest contributor, another veteran TV reporter/critic coming here to play. (A few more, we'll have enough to field a softball team.)

Our newest all-star team member is Diane Holloway, who served, in stellar fashion, as the nationally respected TV critic for the Austin American Statesman in Texas -- for 30 years. Like me, she's a founding member of the Television Critics Association. And like me, she's got plenty of opinions -- as in her inaugural TVWW column, which compares NBC's current Southland (tonight at 10 ET) to the new DVD release of season two of an NBC cop show from another era, Hill Street Blues.

Read on -- and welcome our newest Diane to the fold...

Southland -- Hill Street Blues on fast-forward?

By Diane Holloway

TV-loving baby boomers (that would be me) will recall the arrival of Hill Street Blues in 1981. It was gripping, shocking and brilliant.

We assumed, at least those of us who had never worked in law enforcement, that it was probably realistic, too.

That was before The Wire and The Shield showed us just how excruciatingly real TV could be -- from the gruesome violence to the filthy mouths. We were such innocents back in the Hill Street era.

But Hill Street was a game-changer in its day. No doubt about it, and most of today's dramas owe a lot to Steven Bochco's boys (and girls) in blue.

Southland, NBC's new cop drama, recently slipped into the appointment slot ER had long held on Thursday nights. Both shows spring from the creative mind of John Wells, so it makes symmetrical sense that gritty police action should take over where life-and-death medical drama once lived.

With its fast-paced storytelling, large cast of cleverly-crafted characters, gritty look and tsunami of bleeped-out four-letter words, Southland may remind some viewers of The Shield, the late-great FX drama that reveled in raw language and didn't have to bleep it.

Hints of dark secrets and trauma permeate the cops on Southland, especially showcased partners John Cooper (Michael Cudlitz) and rookie Ben Sherman (Ben McKenzie). Hard-nosed vet Cooper has already let it spill that his father is in jail, and Ben has revealed that despite his privileged upbringing, he witnessed stunning violence in his home when he was younger.

Hill Street fans will recall gasping when we learned secrets about the characters on that show. Gasp! Frank Furillo was an alcoholic and (gasp-gasp!) was romantically involved with attorney Joyce Davenport.

Secrets and surprises -- we love 'em!

I was a huge fan of Hill Street. Never missed an episode. And I was predisposed to like Southland for two reasons: John Wells is genius, and young Ben McKenzie is a fine young actor from Austin whom I've come to believe has serious potential. Southland just might do for him what ER did for George Clooney.

About a week after Southland debuted, I was at loose ends and popped in Hill Street's second-season DVD. Wow! I did NOT expect to see such a difference. Based on my memory, I thought the two shows would be kissin' cousins.

The biggest difference was pace. Hill Street may have been fast-paced for its day, but it is s-l-o-o-o-o-w compared with today's shows. Characters such as Howard Hunter and Phil Esterhaus engaged in meandering philosophical conversations that lasted close to 10 minutes. They were smart and amusing chats (often about manhood and Grace Gardner). Today, 10 minutes is about the entire length of storytelling time between commercials.

Commercials. An hour-long drama gave up only 10 to 12 minutes of ad time back then. Today, we're lucky to get 42 minutes of real story time in an hour-long show.

That little economic reality has a major impact on a show's pace. Hill Street plays out in languid fashion, regardless of all the action; Southland rushes along with quick scenes and jerky storytelling.

Oddly enough, both the old and the new pacing can be effective -- and enjoyable. But watching an episode of Southland (online at NBC's show page) followed by an episode of Hill Street (streaming at Hulu) definitely requires shifting to a slower gear.

It's a good thing I didn't try this comparison of the old and the new with 24. I might have wound up screaming at Furillo to pick up the pace! As we say in Texas, slow down and enjoy the ride.

--

Diane Holloway was the TV critic for the Austin American Statesman for 30 years, until the downturn in the newspaper business prompted her to take a buyout and early retirement. Retirement? More like between jobs. She's still sniffing out possibilities and sifting through freelance opportunities. Before newspapers, she worked in Washington for the Library of Congress, the American Film Institute and the National Endowment for the Arts. Maybe something entirely different is next. Or not.

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GUEST BLOG #12: Tom Brinkmoeller Loves Public TV's No-EVOO Diet

April 29, 2009 8:37 AM

Bianculli here: Tom Brinkmoeller, for his latest column, reverted to his old print reporter instincts, and conducted interviews as well as delivered his own opinion. The topic: TV's food shows. And while I'll agree to disagree with him about Gordon Ramsay, whose shows I find immensely entertaining, he's really onto something about the respective informative values of certain shows.

Here's Tom's full report...

Without Public Television, We All Would Be Drowning in EVOO

By Tom Brinkmoeller

If you understand the difference between a really good museum and a circus, you no doubt can see the huge differences between the prototype cooking, how-to and travel series on public television and the badly executed rip-offs that populate cable's Food Network, HGTV, Travel Channel and their lesser sycophant cable brethren.

One is art. The other is clowns and animals.

Some comparisons: Watch any Julia Child or Jacques Pepin series, or America's Test Kitchen, or Gourmet's Diary of a Foodie, or almost any other public broadcasting cooking show (the wonderful reality is there are so many), and you actually learn how to cook. You're entertained, but it's secondary to making the half-hour a worthwhile investment. It's intelligent, clearly presented and non-gimmicky. There's an art involved, and you get to watch.

Then watch any Food Network show hosted by Rachael Ray, Paula Deen, Sandra Lee or even Ina Garten or Giada De Laurentiis and if you're interested in learning to cook, you have to question your investment. Learning too often gets put far behind meaningless story lines, empty glitz, cross-promotion and product placement.

Could it be that these shows get sprayed with PAM before airing, so nothing too important sticks to them? At least they are better than the truly awful food-competition shows, which would seem to attract people who like to watch crying contestants get voted off the set and those viewers who will sit through a thoroughly boring hour to see if a cake falls over or apart before it's judged.

A few more comparisons -- in case you're not yet convinced -- before a little analysis. Compare public TV's Rick Steves, Globe Trekker or Rudy Maxa shows with those hosted by:

-- Samantha Brown (a decent travel journalist trapped inside a network that appears to have minimal ethics when it comes to a business buying its way onto the show).

-- Anthony Bourdain (perhaps the angriest man on television after Regis Philbin, but decidedly less professional or entertaining).

-- Andrew Zimmern (a man who has gotten himself airtime simply by showing he'll eat any insect or innard -- a quality my wife's childhood dog had, but it didn't win him a series).

Finally, see if you can discover the quality thread of This Old House and The New Yankee Workshop in commercial knockoffs Carter Can or Design on a Dime. Are the production standards similar in The Victory Garden and Desperate Landscapes?

Of course, there is no comparison. PBS invented and has perfected TV Worth Watching in these categories. Over the years, cable has largely acted as an anti-alchemist, repeatedly turning gold into lead. Most unjust is that these high-quality originals have to work like crazy for underwriting. Meanwhile, the propensity to do anything to attract higher advertising rates helps the commercial bandits pay bills and makes people like EVOO peddler Rachael Ray wealthy. (The words "extra virgin olive oil" may be too hard for her to say.)

How does this sit with the inventors of these genres? Russell Morash produced every Julia Child series from her television start in the early '60s, and invented This Old House, Ask This Old House, The New Yankee Workshop and The Victory Garden. He cut back his busy schedule in 2004, handing over control of all but The New Yankee Workshop. Separation hasn't lessened his interest, though. Standards for shows that have taken his concepts commercial, he says, have dropped "beyond zero."

On his PBS shows, hosts also have been collaborators, shaping the programming and raising quality levels. Morash says Norm Abram and French Chef Julia Child have shared the quality of thoroughly knowing the subject before the shooting starts -- a quality not deemed necessaryhosts are chosen for looks and how they will on the commercial networks. Too often, Morash says, appeal to a demographic target, and program concepts are born in marketers' minds.

"Julia did not have all the chromium, but she could cook the hell out of a show," he says. "She had another disarming characteristic. She was very smart, well-schooled. She knew what she was talking about, and she kept that up her entire life.

"Norm is the same way. He reads about and understands the entire technique before he does something he's never done before."

These qualities don't show themselves on the copies of the originals. Be it a how-to fix program that skips over the details of a project to fit it into a half-hour package or a cooking show that's more drama than substance, a program is built to fit a concept.

Morash says he recently watched an episode of Hell's Kitchen in which star Gordon Ramsay's main purpose seemed to be "to insult and abuse these youngsters." Morash's wife, Marian, watched with him. She was the cooking expert on The Victory Garden and also worked for many years in the kitchen of an East Coast five-star seafood restaurant. More than their astonishment at the chef's theatrical demeanor ("beyond abusive"), they couldn't believe Ramsay would charge the contestants with creating a signature dish in 45 minutes. Morash's wife pointed out that many truly talented chefs consider it an achievement if they can create a true "signature dish" over a 45-year career.

The commercial networks' appetite for the wrapping paper over the content is nothing new. Morash accompanied Ms. Child many years ago to a cooking appearance on Good Morning America. Seventy-seven seconds into the segment, a network executive in the control room turned to Morash and said, "This is really boring!"

Though they've seen their masterpieces counterfeited into the equivalent of velvet paintings for sale on a roadside lot, the good guys haven't given up on their dream of producing TV Worth Watching. Laurie Donnelly has been working in public television for 34 years and, as the WGBH executive producer of lifestyle programming, oversees the programs Morash created, as well as Simply Ming and Gourmet's Diary of a Foodie. She says these types of programs will continue to thrive as long they're "presented in a way that's not intimidating and not condescending" by "experts who have a passion for what they do."

Finding underwriters, she says, "is always a challenge." But experience has shown her that there's always "the right fit" for programming that makes high quality and accessibility the most important ingredients.

Just imagine how far television would sink without those kinds of principles.

--

Tom writes: For a number of years, Tom Brinkmoeller was paid to watch and write about television. That seemingly ideal situation can't match his current one -- watching only what he enjoys, not being held hostage by a paycheck, and not having to steer a TV story through editors who think watching television impairs the brain as well as social status.

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GUEST BLOG #11: Ed Martin Checks Into "General Hospital"

April 27, 2009 6:44 AM

Bianculli here: Today's guest column has Ed Martin, who counts daytime soaps among his specialties, offering ways to further revitalize ABC's recently recharged General Hospital. I'm not a fan of the show these days -- but if Ed's ideas about swapped lookalikes, revived dead characters and long-dormant revenge plots come to pass, I just might become one.

Click to read his full column about Constance Towers, Elizabeth Taylor and others...

How Helena Cassadine Can Save General Hospital

By Ed Martin

ABC's once-mighty General Hospital has been on a downward slide for far too long. Too many years of too many violent and repetitive (and ultimately silly) stories about mobsters and their women, coupled with the senseless deaths in recent years of a number of popular core characters, have left it in ruins.

But the last two weeks have brought with them a blast from the past that has once again made GH a television show worth watching. Given the industry's cock-eyed obsession with youth at the expense of all else, it is rather satisfying to report that the bolt of lightning that has brightened up the dull and dreary world of Port Charles is a sizzling senior citizen played by Constance Towers, a veteran actress who was born in 1933 and is now in her sixth decade of film and television work! As the murderous, manipulative madwoman Helena Cassadine, Ms. Towers rocks the witch.

Actually, I have never been a fan of the all-powerful, unstoppable, bloodthirsty Helena. She was created way back in 1981 as the means by which Elizabeth Taylor -- then a self-declared GH super-fan -- could attend the wedding of the now-legendary Luke and Laura. She was barely referenced during the decade that followed, except when Laura disappeared (in early 1982, when Genie Francis left the show) and reappeared (in late 1983) after being held captive at the Cassadine compound in Greece, where she was forced to marry Helena's oldest son Stavros. But throughout much of the '90s and frequently during this decade Helena has returned to Port Charles time and again to cause all kinds of trouble.

As written for Ms. Taylor, Helena was the epitome of class and elegance, her malevolence measured by her place in international society. But as written for Ms. Towers, she is just a mad, malevolent meddler. If it were up to me, Helena would never have come back to Port Charles after the big wedding, or she would have been killed off years ago. Back in the days of the grand executive producer Gloria Monty, when stories on the show had distinct beginnings and endings and villains came and went, always paying for their crimes, a homicidal evildoer like Helena would have never been permitted to survive for as long as she has.

But I am so alarmed by the current state of General Hospital that I'm going to cut Helena some slack. In fact, I now believe Helena could be utilized in a story that would undo much of the seemingly irreversible damage that has been done to GH during this decade, especially where the show's once story-rich Quartermaine family is concerned.

Indeed, it seems to me GH has been losing fans at a rapid clip since it began killing off members of the Quartermaine clan. It would take a drastic and outrageous story to fix the resultant mess, and that's precisely what makes Helena uniquely qualified to ride to the rescue on her broomstick. The character and her family's history, dating back almost 30 years, are so over the top that nothing she might do would surprise viewers. After all, it was the saga of the Cassadine family's plan to freeze Port Charles in August 1981, by way of a weather-controlling machine hidden on a remote tropical island, that propelled GH into the pop-culture pantheon even before Luke and Laura famously got hitched.

Here's what GH should do with Helena. In a wild storyline that would recall the GH of old, it should be revealed that AJ, the oldest son of Drs. Alan and Monica Quartermaine, did not die in 2005 when he was murdered by an already forgotten minor character. Rather, one of Helena's minions got to AJ before his "lifeless" body was discovered and injected him with one of those only-on-a-soap drugs that kept him alive, albeit with a barely perceptible heartbeat. AJ was later removed from the now-crowded Quartermaine crypt and whisked away to that secret lab Helena had built ages ago, several floors below the basement of the title hospital. In 2001, we were told that Helena's son Stavros hadn't really died when Luke seemingly killed him back in 1983. He was actually in that same subterranean lab in a state of suspended animation awaiting the development of the treatment that would revive him almost two decades later.

As Helena's story progressed, we would learn that Cassadine medical personnel revived AJ and slowly nursed him back to health, all the while programming him to be loyal to Helena, who had grown tired of her long-running conflict with Luke and Laura Spencer and decided instead to seek long-overdue revenge on the Quartermaines -- and not simply because Tracy Quartermaine is now married to Luke. Longtime viewers will recall that it was a Quartermaine -- the globe-trotting Alexandra -- who first brought the Cassadines to Port Charles back in 1981 and touched off a series of events that eventually led to the death of Helena's beloved husband, Mikkos. With AJ as her pawn, Helena would eventually take control of the Quartermaines' vast business empire, restoring her to a position of great power in the international financial community.

We could then happily discover that, despite his programmed loyalty to Helena, AJ felt the need to make things right with his father Alan, whom AJ shot in the back the last time the two were together. When Alan suffered that fatal heart attack after the Metro Court Hotel hostage crisis in 2007, AJ secretly arranged to have him brought to Helena's subterranean lab, where he has since been stabilized and remains in a coma. Helena was fine with this because she had nothing against Alan and thought that he, too, could be useful to her if he regained his health, perhaps as chief of staff at General Hospital after she takes control of it.

Further, it would be revealed that Helena had, at the time of Emily Quartermaine's murder in 2007, been having the young intern followed at all times, since she despised the girl and could not abide the love her grandson Nikolas Cassadine had for her. Helena had been planning to kidnap Emily and brainwash her into rejecting Nikolas, and she had arranged for a double to replace Emily while the brainwashing took place. As it happens, it wasn't Emily whom Diego Alcazar murdered on that fateful night. It was the double. (Remember, the actual murder occurred off-camera!) The recently introduced Rebecca would turn out to be the brainwashed Emily, sent into action by Helena as part of her nefarious plan.

There are other much-missed characters that could be tucked away in Helena's lab, including Justus Ward, the grandson of Quartermaine patriarch Edward, and Georgie Jones, ex-wife of Tracy's son Dillon. It's not like any of this extreme science-fiction would be new to GH, or even to the Cassadines. After all, Stefan Cassadine secretly kept Lesley Webber alive for 12 years after Helena attempted to kill her in 1984, and Helena held Lucky Spencer hostage for one year and brainwashed him while Luke and Laura grieved the "loss" of their son in a fire. And, as mentioned above, Helena kept a comatose Stavros alive for 18 years until he returned to briefly wreak havoc on the residents of Port Charles in 2001 before falling into a bottomless pit in that same subterranean lab. The Cassadines are world-class experts at mischievously switching bodies, keeping the almost dead alive, creating convincing lookalikes, and fooling everyone into thinking their loved ones are either lost or not. We need them to be restored to their full power, and we need that now!

Think of the excitement that would be generated by this wild and wacky storyline -- one that would be very vintage GH -- as so many much-missed characters returned to the narrative in the biggest Cassadine caper since the classic story of the weather machine. (And if some of them had to be recast, so what?) Best of all, the sublime Ms. Towers could act the hell out of it all as she became the shining salvation of daytime drama that she deserves to be.

----

Ed Martin is the television critic and programming analyst for the media industry Web site JackMyers.com. The former senior editor of the award-winning, much-missed television and advertising trade magazine Inside Media, Ed has also written for USA Today, Advertising Age, Television Week, Broadcasting & Cable and TV Guide.
Earlier in his career, Ed was publicity director for the independent feature film production and distribution company Vestron Pictures, where he orchestrated publicity campaigns and produced electronic press kits for dozens of movies including the one and only Dirty Dancing. The fact that it is now referred to as a "classic" makes Ed feel old.

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"Celebrity Apprentice" Heavyweight Diva Duel: Float Like a Butterfly, Sting Like a Beeyotch

April 24, 2009 11:02 AM

Cain vs. Abel. Frasier vs. Ali. And now, in this corner, another duel for the ages: Joan Rivers vs. Annie Duke.

NBC's Celebrity Apprentice has been providing some of the most jaw-dropping television of the season. And, I'm happy to say, it's not over yet. Last week was the best, most riveting, most unbelievable episode of Donald Trump's TV show ever broadcast -- and the two main combatants, comedienne Rivers and poker champion Duke, both survived to fight another day...

This season of Celebrity Apprentice (Sundays at 9 p.m. ET) started with larger-than-life characters being eliminated quickly: Tom Green for being too goofy, Dennis Rodman for being too inebriated and surly, Andrew Dice Clay for being too... Andrew Dice Clay. But those were undercards to this season's championship bout.

"I'm going to crush you, Joan," Annie Duke informed her rival, when the two of them agreed to be project managers of their respective teams on a charity auction task. Nice talk. But it was said with a smile. And in any event, it was a lot nicer than when Rivers, in the boardroom after her loss, compared Duke to Adolf Hitler. Really.

"She does seem nice to me," Trump said of Duke, after hearing Rivers toss some insults her way.

"So does Hitler at Buchenwald," Rivers shoots back.

It was such a stunner that both of Trump's boardroom lieutenants last week -- former Celebrity Apprentice winner Piers Morgan and Trump's daughter, Ivanka -- reacted with stunned double-takes. "Hitler?" Morgan asked. "Have you ever been compared to Hitler before?" Ivanka asked Duke.

Morgan was equally thrown by Melissa Rivers' constant defense of her mother's actions and comments, and criticisms of Duke, even though the younger Rivers was on Duke's team. "I find this dynamic fascinating," Morgan admitted, challenging Melissa Rivers' conduct. "You would speak up and knife your leader to suck up to your mum."

Morgan was right on the money questioning that dynamic. So was Ivanka Trump, who has matured, since first coming aboard as one of her father's TV lieutenants, into a very poised and precise presence on the show. When she asked Joan Rivers about her feelings if Joan outlasts her own daughter on the show, Joan said it would be okay, so long as Melissa lost fairly rather than being thrown under a bus.

"If I were thrown under the bus," Ivanka replied with a cool, knowing smile, "my father would be disappointed in me for allowing myself to get in the way of that bus."

Great stuff. This far into the game, there are two official teams (KOTU, with Joan Rivers and Clint Black, and Athena, with Annie Duke, Melissa Rivers, former Playboy Playmate Brande Roderick and Jesse James). There's also a third, unofficial team: the Rivers running through it.

Donald Trump's firing decisions, while seeming capricious on occasion, always make sense in the larger picture. And because he IS in charge, I have little doubt of this season's outcome. When you have competitors as naturally vehement towards one another as Joan Rivers and Annie Duke have grown to be, they almost have to reach the final. Otherwise, any other climax would be more of an anti-climax.

But if it goes to a Duke vs. Rivers title card, what an ending that will be, and what a ride until then. "She's a crazy bitch," Annie Duke said of Rivers afterward. And Rivers, on her own Twitter mini-blog, posted the following: "I just compared Annie to Hitler and I feel terrible. My apologies to Hitler."

Melissa Rivers, who should have gone home weeks ago, eventually will be fired, which should make for two levels of drama. And if the final task mirrors the celebrity auction, where Duke's wealthy friends flew in to support her while Rivers saved her team's presentation but raised little money, this contest could well get down to, instead of how many people you know, how many friends you have.

For the record: My money's on Annie Duke -- to go all the way, and to win this thing, deservedly. She's come off as smart, determined and charming. Both generations of Rivers, by contrast, bring to mind three very different adjectives: stubborn, abrasive and co-dependent.

Also for the record: Donald Trump, with this season of Celebrity Apprentice, already is in the winner's circle. And why not? His show is better than ever, and his daughter radiates beauty and intelligence in equal proportions.

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TV Worth Watching Begs: Networks, Please, Renew These Shows

April 23, 2009 7:46 AM

Last year at about this time, ABC renewed Pushing Daisies, one of the best shows in its entire lineup -- then yanked it prematurely once the new season began. This year, with the announcements of next year's prime-time schedules only weeks away, there's still time for the networks to make some smart moves -- and some TV-improving renewals -- and, this time, stick with them. But will they?

Some good news is obvious already. NBC struck a two-year extension on the deal with DirecTV to share costs on the production of Friday Night Lights, so we'll have that fabulous show for a few more reasons, with Coach Taylor reassigned to a much lower-rent high school operation. That's terrific -- even if, by the time the episodes get to NBC, they're slightly used goods.

Fringe, on Fox, is a sure bet to return, and a quality show that deserves it. And one of the best new shows of the season, The Mentalist on CBS, also is by far the most popular among all new series, so its renewal is assured. Quality, in this case, has risen to the top of the ratings -- but that doesn't always happen. Quality TV shows, like orchids, can be hothouse flowers that need a lot of nurturing and patience.

Each network, right now, has some shows on the bubble that are likely to develop more in a sophomore season, or be better than most other things coming down the cost-crunched pipeline. If, that is the networks exercise taste and patience -- neither of which, of course, is in strong supply these days.

At ABC, that includes new shows Better Off Ted and Castle, and the still-delightful Scrubs, pulled from NBC's Death Row this season.

At CBS, The New Adventures of Old Christine is such a funny show, the only reason I can imagine CBS might not renew it is that no one at the network's Black Rock headquarters is actually watching it.

At NBC, two veteran shows, My Name Is Earl and Medium, aren't as tired as they should be after this much time, and have earned the right for another year.

And at Fox, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles has presented enough inventive surprises and twists to keep the story going. If Fox doesn't renew the show, some cable network should.

But there are two shows TV Worth Watching is begging to see come back -- even if rescued by another network. NBC's Life is one. Fox's Dollhouse is another.

Life, staring Damian Lewis and Sarah Shahi, is almost certainly a goner at NBC. The 10 p.m. Leno decision saw to that, since there are few places to put Life, and its ratings are too modest to argue for its return by any measure other than quality.

Yet the show and the performances are so good, I hate to see it go. The season finale -- which could well be the series finale -- was unexpected and understated enough to provide a haunting coda to the year. But I want more. This is actually the kind of show that would work on Fox (quirky character in the lead) or CBS (self-contained murders, cleverly solved) equally well. Someone, please, let Life live.

Then there's Dollhouse. The latest Joss Whedon series hasn't done that well in the Friday night limbo slot where Fox stuck it, and isn't a good bet for renewal. But last week, the return of Prison Break drew significantly fewer viewers in the same time slot, especially among the younger demographic, so maybe the executives at Fox -- smart and tasteful ones, as TV executives go -- will rethink, and renew.

That would be wonderful, because Dollhouse really kicked into a higher gear the last several episodes, and a second season would be sure to mature significantly. Season two was when Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel deepened and blossomed, and Fox never let Firefly get to a second season. Please, please, don't make the same mistake with Dollhouse.

Or, if Fox lets it go, someone else should pick it up. These shows shouldn't die prematurely, as Daisies did.

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DirecTV Makes Two More Brilliant TV Acquisitions: "Oz" and "Deadwood"

April 22, 2009 10:14 AM

Since most broadcast networks seem to be abandoning quality, the field is wide open for a competing network to embrace it. Satellite's DirecTV is doing just that, and has just added two more champion thoroughbreds to its stable: the first off-HBO telecasts of Tom Fontana's Oz and David Milch's Deadwood.

Starting May 31, DirecTV 101 Network -- which already has kept NBC's Friday Night Lights alive and is about to present never-before-seen episodes of CBS's Smith and ABC's Eyes -- announced Wednesday it is presenting unedited, uninterrupted episodes of Oz and Deadwood as a weekly double feature. In HD. From start to finish.

Oz, the prison drama that taught the TV industry what the freedom of cable could mean when applied to a drama series by a visionary and maverick writer-producer, has never been repeated elsewhere since its original, pre-Sopranos HBO run. Deadwood is in the midst of a rerun cycle on one of HBO's subsidiary networks, but this is the first time it, too, will be offered to non-HBO subscribers.

Both series are fabulous. Deadwood, that brutal Shakepearean Western, was killed one off or two years too early by HBO, while Oz may have gone on one year too late -- but both series are unforgettable, unique examples of quality TV. There has been no other series quite like Oz, or quite like Deadwood, before or since. And reruns are fun, because since-familiar faces keep popping up, like Kristen Bell on Deadwood, just before she starred in Veronica Mars.

Presenting them both, and as a package, is DirecTV's way of saying it's very, very serious about establishing itself as television's premier Quality TV franchise.

The only down side is that Oz and Deadwood are being shown beginning Sunday nights at 9 ET, which pits these classic episodes against fresh product by both HBO and Showtime. Deadwood and Oz may have drawn more weekly viewers on a different, slower night -- Friday or Saturday, perhaps -- but with availability at other times during the week, and on DirecTV On Demand, real-time time slots don't matter as much as they once did.

But to DirecTV, at least, quality does. Hooray for our side.

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GUEST BLOG #10: P.J. Bednarski offers an 'American Idol'/Jimmy Durante mashup

April 21, 2009 5:21 AM

Bianculli here: Yesterday, guest columnist Tom Brinkmoeller came down on one side of a hot-button current journalistic issue, whether "vintage" references in stories were helpful or irritating to readers, especially those much-coveted younger ones. Today, another of our new TV WORTH WATCHING correspondents, P.J. Bednarski, takes the opposing view.

I'd make a "Jane, you ignorant slut" joke here -- but since that Dan Aykroyd retort to Jane Curtin on "Weekend Update" from Saturday Night Live is over 30 years old, that's sort of the point at hand. So read P.J. (and, if you missed yesterday's post, Tom), then weigh in yourself...

Forget the Past: It's Like, History

By P.J.Bednarski

When J. Max Robins became the editor in chief of Broadcasting & Cable magazine in 2004, his role was to goose the place into the 21st century. He often told us that before he took over, he had read a lead in the magazine that referred to Jimmy Durante, and that was a cultural reach-back that bothered him a lot. B&C was just too damn old to appeal to younger readers. By making hipper references, B&C circulation briefly spiked past Maxim, before readers noticed that the stories were still about subjects like "cable must-carry" and "multicasting," and things went back to normal.

The offending lead: "As Jimmy Durante was fond of saying, 'Everybody wants to get into the act!'" was written in 2003. Jimmy Durante, actor, vaudevillian, guy with a big nose, always signed off performances with "Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are," and he died in 1980.

The fact is, Robins was right to at least make reporters make more contemporary references, and Editor & Publisher is on solid ground suggesting that newspapers could get a little more hep, daddy-o. After all, the Catholics quit performing the Mass in Latin more than 40 years ago, and Latin was a dead language for quite a long time before that. Talk about being the last network to go HD.

But we live in a time of throwaway information, with disposable stars, victims and even reputations, and now, through American Idol and You Tube, there are even shortcut pipelines to fame. It's also as fleeting as possible. Journalists should know history; so should regular old people. But it's out of fashion. Those who forget history are bound to repeat it. Those who remember history are bound to get bored stares.

Oh, we lucky, pitiful Baby Boomers; we grew up in two worlds between a great war and a great upheaval, mainly created by our parents, who spawned like rabbits. We knew Bob Hope. He wasn't the least bit funny, but we knew that at one time, he was. We knew, or knew about, Edward R. Murrow, Charles Lindbergh, Joe McCarthy and Timothy Leary, Billy Graham, napalm, Elvis Presley and The Pill. And yet, well into my 20s, after the Rolling Stones, acid, the summer of love, Vietnam, Woodstock, the Manson Family and Kent State, new year's eve on TV still meant Guy Lombardo and the Royal Canadians. Though our world was certainly not at peace, generationally or otherwise, anomalies abounded. Which had bonuses. It's how I listened to Dusty Springfield, Frank Sinatra and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, all on the same radio station, and there was a newscast every hour that actually reported news.

The Internet, and cable, changed all that. Once, networks and newspapers set the agenda. They were institutions. They're going away.

The speed of pop culture and its pure abundance has made less mean a lot more. On the other hand, it's over quicker; here today, gone by this afternoon. So, as E&P says, if you're going to make references, they'd better be fresh ones. The fame-making machine is a remarkable display of the speed of newsworthy shock followed quickly, very quickly, by inevitable blah.

Last week, a young, good friend sent me the video link to The Lonely Island's I'm on a Boat, with lyrics like these:

Fuck land, I'm on a boat, motherfucker (motherfucker)
Fuck trees, I climb buoys, motherfucker (motherfucker)
I'm on the deck with my boys, motherfucker (yeah)
This boat engine make noise, motherfucker

And so on. The Lonely Island is a comedy group, also known for videos Dick in a Box and Jizz in My Pants, and helped along by Saturday Night Live. Fuck isn't very shocking anymore. I'm not even shocked by the banality. But I am amazed by the popularity of it. You can get I'm on a Boat as a ringtone, and as of Friday, the video has been viewed 18,215,531 times on YouTube. Assume for a second it's funny. Is it 18.2- fucking-million funny? No, it isn't.

And when a TV critic recalls that in 1990, the short-lived CBS sitcom Uncle Buck made headlines when one of its young characters exclaimed "You suck!" the how-times-change notation only makes a difference to those who remember when there was a mainstream culture, or corporate or moral gatekeepers. Now, who cares? History is over. Everybody's famous for five minutes, and forgotten three minutes later. Good night, Mr. Durante, whoever you are.

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P.J. Bednarski is a veteran TV critic and former executive editor of Broadcasting & Cable magazine.

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GUEST BLOG #9: Tom Brinkmoeller pits Hawkeye vs. Hannah

April 20, 2009 5:22 AM

Bianculli here: This is going to be fun. Two of the new contributors to TV WORTH WATCHING are taking opposite sides of a very touchy issue. Namely: Is referring to "vintage" references when writing about pop culture putting things in context, or alienating younger readers being targeted by mass media as necessary for survival?

Today, Tom Brinkmoeller. Tomorrow, in the opposite corner, P.J. Bednarski. And boy, are all of us interested in what YOU have to say on this topic. Read on, and return tomorrow, and weigh in yourself...

It's 2009. Do YOU know who Eddie Haskell is?

By Tom Brinkmoeller

--OK, PJ. My gauntlet is old and unattractive, but I throw it down with as much gusto as my arthritis allows.--

As a Boomer, I know what it's like to have lots of attention pointed at my crowd. While it lasted, it was an intriguing time. Now it's a new season, our leaves fell from the holy tree of demographic influence a while ago, and another set of leaves is eating up the attention.

That's the way it always happens, it's natural, and what follows isn't the ranting of a jilted Geezer Boomer. The relative obscurity is pleasant.

What bothers me is that, in hoping to win the love of the current techo-generation, the country's mega-marketers have decided the "leaves" of previous generations are carcinogenic, at best, and must be destroyed, or at least ignored. They fear that references to anything that predates American Idol or is older than Hannah Montana will offend and confuse the precious target audience and result in an economic catastrophe. What's past, no matter how brilliant or enriching, is no longer prologue. It's a prime target of the delete key.

Television leads the large group of the fearful. The Techno-gens have their own brand of ambition, so contest series -- survivors, racers, bachelors, overeaters, dancers, singers, models, designers and plenty of other lemmings -- just about own prime time because the Technos identify with beating out the rest of the bunch and owning the spotlight.

I wrote a few weeks ago about a current series, Scrubs, and referenced a couple of classic TV shows in the process. A worry was passed on to me that most Technos weren't alive in 1983, when M*A*S*H ended, and that reference probably lost them.

Editor & Publisher, a trade publication that follows newspapers (think of the people who tracked the passenger pigeon into extinction), recently posted a story headlined "Journos Are Alienating Readers With 'Retro' References." The author cited stories he's sure lost many readers because they made references to Leave It to Beaver characters, The Andy Griffith Show, Dragnet, the '60s film Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? and other pieces of the past Technos hadn't lived through.

Are many Technos reading TV WORTH WATCHING? Probably not. Those who do visit the site know it celebrates and explains high quality entertainment. A M*A*S*H reference almost surely didn't offend them, and if they didn't know it, they either did a quick Web search or texted an old person to get the answer.

And newspapers don't alienate readers by talking about Eddie Haskell or Barney Fife, because they never had them to begin with. Newspapers, in the minds of most of the current demographic darlings, are as odd and as obscure as cars with spark plugs, 14.4 modems and telephones you plug into a wall.

David Bianculli recently reviewed a series called The Cougar. The premise is a 40-year-old woman looks for love among a throng of boys half her age. "The Newspaper" would have been a more descriptive title. Print executives across the country have turned their backs on their own, the ones that have supported them for years, to chase after much-younger masses that are only interested if the attention can earn them money and fame.

"History builds on itself" once was an accepted axiom. It has been eclipsed by "If it doesn't have a good following on Twitter, it's useless."

Sorry, Miley, but I'm certain Hawkeye Pierce will be remembered long after Hannah dissolves into a small puddle.

--

Tom writes: For a number of years, Tom Brinkmoeller was paid to watch and write about television. That seemingly ideal situation can't match his current one -- watching only what he enjoys, not being held hostage by a paycheck, and not having to steer a TV story through editors who think watching television impairs the brain as well as social status.

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GUEST BLOG #8: Ed Martin Votes No On "American Idol" Format Changes

April 17, 2009 7:42 AM

Guest columnist Ed Martin, in his latest excellent missive for TV Worth Watching, vents his frustration about this season's format changes to Fox's American Idol. The fact that I agree with his completely only makes it that much more fun to present.

Here's his lead paragraph:

"Are the inmates running the asylum over at American Idol – a show that is far too important to millions of viewers, not to mention the business of television, to mess around with? It seems that with each passing week this show gives its loyal viewers something new to complain about."

For the full story, read on... and let us know what YOU think...

"Idol" Hands Are Ruining What Ain't Broke

By Ed Martin

Are the inmates running the asylum over at American Idol -- a show that is far too important to millions of viewers, not to mention the business of television, to mess around with? It seems that with each passing week this show gives its loyal viewers something new to complain about.

If I didn't know better, I would swear that Idol is suddenly being produced by people who have not been involved with it in any way during its first seven seasons. Topping the growing list of bad Idol moves this season is the Judges Save, which has proven to be the second-worst format tweak in the show's history (the first being those time-wasting viewer call-ins during Season 7).

The decision to make the contestants who receive the lowest number of votes each week sing once again in the hope that the judges might use a one-time-only opportunity to reverse the audience's decision, and then stand there and be told all over again that they still aren't good enough to continue, undercut the impact of the weekly painful eliminations that add so much drama to the show. The contestants were made to look awkward, and the judges made to look cruel, while the home audience was made to suffer a second time through the performances it enjoyed the least. It's been an epic failure all around.

This week we finally saw the Judges Save in action, as Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Kara DioGuardi seemingly ganged up on sensible Simon Cowell and forced him to save the talented but inconsistent Matt Giraud from the elimination viewers called for after his lame rendition of Bryan Adams' "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman" the night before. Surely some percentage of the people who contributed to the 36 million votes cast on Tuesday night wondered why they had bothered making those calls as they watched the week's least popular performer receive a reprieve.

Paula, Kara, the studio audience and Matt's fellow contestants almost blew the studio roof off with their near-nuclear euphoria over Matt's good fortune, so much so that the ominous follow-up reminder from Simon about the bitter backwash to come seemed to make little impact. (In fact, Paula charged the stage to congratulate Matt right after Simon spoke.)

"Guys, girls, I wouldn't be so quick to congratulate him," Simon cautioned. "No. 1, two people are going home next week now," he added, reminding them all that the rules of the Save call for a double whammy the week after it is used.

Then he really let them have it. "Second piece of bad news: Next week is Disco Week." Disco Week is never a good one for Idol contestants.

I like Matt. In fact, I would rather see Anoop Desai and Lil Rounds go home before him. Still, as jubilant as the audience and the contestants were when they learned that he had been saved, and even though Matt was moved to tears by it all, I have to say that as a viewer I felt robbed of what should have been a memorable moment this season -- the forced farewell of a talented contestant who just isn't good enough to outlast the others.

It didn't help that the Save came during a week in which the Idol producers made another mammoth blunder. Responding to all that furious complaining from critics and bloggers alike about last week's talent show running nine minutes too long, the producers this week decided on Tuesday that, in an effort to save time and keep the show moving, only two judges would critique each performance rather than all four.

If you agree with my assertion that Simon is the only judge worth listening to, then you'll agree that it was a stupid move by all concerned to cut his airtime in half. And since when is it so difficult to make time for comments from four judges? Past seasons of Idol have featured numerous outspoken guest judges in the mix, and I don't recall the show ever having so many production issues as a result.

As for that now-infamous nine-minute overrun, I feel that experienced producers should know how to bring a show in on time after seven successful years, just as smart network executives should know enough to add an additional half-hour to telecasts of the biggest show on television when they have so much good material with which to work. Any viewer could have told people in both camps that eight performances in 60 minutes minus all that time for commercials would be a tight fit.

But in my humble opinion, there was a little too much crabbing about this matter. I realize that DVRs are all the rage these days, but I think the Tuesday performance shows should be watched live for maximum effectiveness, especially by those all-important viewers who plan to vote. Further, DVR users have nobody but themselves to blame if they haven't learned by now to add at least an extra 10 minutes to programmed recordings of their favorite shows, because broadcast and cable networks alike are increasingly playing fast and loose with running times on their schedules.

The truth is, millions of people who watched that edition live did not miss Adam Lambert's outstanding rendition of Tears for Fears' "Mad World," or the rare spectacle of the usually immobile Simon Cowell rising to his feet afterward. For those who did miss it, it didn't take long for a clip to appear on YouTube and elsewhere.

It's a shame such stuff is happening this season, given the unusually high caliber overall of the contestants, including a couple who have already been eliminated. This is the most talented group to come along in years, and Adam Lambert is the most talked about young talent to appear on this show since Sanjaya Malakar. Of course, everyone was talking about Sanjaya's hair rather than his vocal ability, so that puts Adam on top.

In fact, the steady climb of Adam Lambert is the most exciting story Idol has given us since the ascension of Carrie Underwood (and, before her, Kelly Clarkson). That said, I can totally see Danny Gokey, Kris Allen or Allison Iraheta making their way to the Top 2, and it wouldn't shock me if any one of those three squeaked through with a win.

To continue with my griping -- which should probably be more good-natured than it is, because I am still a huge fan of this show -- it seems to me that the "stars" of Idol must share the blame for some of the recent bad buzz. From where I sit, host Ryan Seacrest has misplaced his youthful enthusiasm and now looks and acts like a business executive who unwittingly stumbled in the side door, found himself on a stage and decided to try his hand at something new.

Meantime, the judges' collective responses no longer carry much weight at all, and their on-camera behavior often deteriorates into a bizarre blend of silliness, confusion and apparent boredom. (I think the camera caught Randy on the verge of yawning during this week's results show.) The low point came a couple of weeks back, when 16-year-old Allison delivered yet another terrific performance only to discover that, while she was singing, Simon had been busily drawing a crayon mustache on Paula.

"Why did you do that?" young Allison asked, as if she were addressing two children who were lobbing spitballs during church.

"Who is the grown-up here?" I wondered, feeling bad for the kid.

Look, the judges only work at Idol a couple hours a week. (I know people who spend more time than that commuting to and from their jobs every day.) From what I hear, Simon, Paula, Randy and Kara are very well compensated for doing so. Is it asking too much for them to bring their A-game to the studio every Tuesday and Wednesday?

----

Ed Martin is the television critic and programming analyst for the media industry Web site JackMyers.com. The former senior editor of the award-winning, much-missed television and advertising trade magazine Inside Media, Ed has also written for USA Today, Advertising Age, Television Week, Broadcasting & Cable and TV Guide.
Earlier in his career, Ed was publicity director for the independent feature film production and distribution company Vestron Pictures, where he orchestrated publicity campaigns and produced electronic press kits for dozens of movies including the one and only Dirty Dancing. The fact that it is now referred to as a "classic" makes Ed feel old.

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"The Cougar" on TV Land: What's Wrong with This Picture?

April 14, 2009 6:11 PM

Posted Wednesday:

Tonight at 10 ET, TV Land presents the premiere of a new reality dating show called The Cougar, starring a 40-year-old single mother of four who works her way through a gaggle of guys in their 20s, searching for true love.

On TV Land? As Seth Meyers might ask, "Really?!?"

If the question is "When, exactly, did TV Land fall out of love with television, and completely lose its mission statement and its way?" -- well, the answer is tonight, with The Cougar...

The Cougar is no more appropriate a show for TV Land than it would be for Animal Planet. There, at least, the title would fit in, even if the content would not.

TV Land was created to cherish and celebrate quality TV -- to keep video memories and legacies alive and have fun with how much fun TV can be. It wasn't created to add to the pile of instantly forgettable TV flotsam and jetsam.

Perhaps it's more irony than coincidence that at the very same time on satellite TV tonight, DirecTV 101 Network is presenting old and never-before-televised episodes of Smith, a 2006 TV series canceled prematurely by CBS.

DirecTV is the network that has helped keep NBC's Friday Night Lights alive with a co-production deal, and has begun to collect and present other underappreciated quality TV series from recent years: Wonderland, Eyes, and so on. Clearly, DirecTV is banking on quality as a lure for viewers, just as Trio used to.

Why is DirecTV going where TV Land no longer cares to tread?

It's astounding how little TV is doing to preserve and present its own glorious history. TV Land barely counts these days -- in prime time, it's pretty much Andy Griffith and Bill Cosby, period (great talents, and great shows, but not to the exclusion of all else) -- and Nick at Nite's idea of vintage quality TV is George Lopez. No kidding.

Well, if anyone out there in TV land -- the larger cable and satellite universe, not just that network -- wants to take TV seriously, here's a free suggestion:

Do it right.

Think along the lines of Masterpiece Theatre, with a well-informed host to present each program, or Inside the Actors Studio, with a guest who can shed light on the shows by providing personal memories and anecdotes.

Ideally, run the programs unedited and uninterrupted, the way Turner Classic Movies does with its films. And run them without speeding them up or chopping them up, as Nick at Nite, TBS and TV Land do ad infinitum, and ad nauseum. Or, if you must retain ads within as well as between offerings, do so in their original act-break placements, and expand time slots so you don't have to trim content from the programs.

Present the shows in imaginative ways. Showcase, for example, an entire evening's content from a given year, including a network newscast. Or showcase recently unearthed TV treasures -- for example, why hasn't the original, just-rediscovered Studio One production of 12 Angry Men, starring Robert Cummings, been shown yet on television, for the first time in half a century?

Where, oh where, are such hard-to-find TV series as The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, with Blair Brown and David Strathairn? Where are He & She and Ernie Kovacs? The Defenders and Hal Holbrook's The Senator?

From public TV, where are The Great American Dream Machine, American Short Story and American Playhouse?

Where's That Was the Week That Was? Or East Side, West Side, with George C. Scott? And where are the classic TV movies and miniseries, such as Duel, Trilogy of Terror and Danger UXB?

You, I;'m sure, haver your own wish lists, and I'd love to hear them.

But for now, regarding vintage television on TV as we now know it, where is the quality? Where is the taste? Where is the perspective?

Who cares? Who needs it?

Here comes The Cougar!

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STUDENT BLOG #1: A Review, and Defense, of "Wrestlemania 25"

April 14, 2009 10:23 AM

While working on the book, I've had several professional TV critics and reporters as guest writers. Today, as an experiment, I'm presenting an amateur. But an informed one.

Since I'm now teaching TV full-time at Rowan University, I thought I'd give a student or two a chance each term to write a review from his or her perspective, on something aimed squarely at the youth demographic. The first of these is a subject that always claims one or two passionate students per term: TV wrestling.

I asked (dared?) Peter Gilgiotti, one of my students, to explain and defend his passion. He agreed, and chose the pay-per-view event Wrestlemania 25 as his subject. Here is his review...

Wrestlemania 25, With Mickey Rourke

By Peter Gigliotti

The 25th anniversary of Wrestlemania was a good show that everyone should see. There were two matches that EVERYONE needs to see.

The first of these matches was Chris Jericho vs. "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, and Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka. This match was a showcase for superstars both young and old. I remember wondering, at prior pay-per-view events, what would happen if two wrestlers from different eras went up against one another. This match, during which Jericho beat all three veteran wrestlers, probably was the closest I will ever get to my answer.

As if that weren't enough, Mickey Rourke was in attendance for the event. Rourke and Jericho have been going back and forth on shows like Larry King Live about getting into a match. The closest thing to an in-the-ring Rourke/Jericho "duel" occurred after Jericho's match against Piper and company, when Jericho saw the star of The Wrestler in the audience at ringside.

Jericho called Rourke into the ring to face him like a man. Rourke obliged, and after some posturing, caught Jericho with a left hook, decking him with a single punch. Rourke then posed with Ric Flair, which was a great moment for a fan of The Wrestler, and of pro wrestling in general.

As good as that match was, the show-stopping match featured The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels. That match had many "oh my god" moments, and that was only in the first ten minutes. The pin attempts were all close and the action was fast paced. If I got this down correctly, there were 14 pin attempts (including the one used to win), seven finishing moves used, and a broken camera.

This is one of those matches you have to see to believe. I have seen many matches from all over the world. These matches span from the 1970s to today. I can honestly say that this is the greatest match I have seen, ever. Even if you aren't a fan of pro wrestling, watch this match and it may change your mind.

---

Peter Gigliotti is a junior Radio/TV/ Film major at Rowan University. He is the creator and writer of The 450 Splash, a professional wrestling blog. For a more in depth analysis, you can read his full review at www.450splash.wordpress.com.

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What Do Jon Stewart and Benjamin Franklin Have in Common? Or Stephen Colbert and Will Rogers?

April 13, 2009 8:04 AM

Today, instead of writing, I'm linking -- to an impressively well-reported essay on Comedy Central Daily Show anchor Jon Stewart, and his place in history.

Not just cable history, or TV history... but history. (Yes, Virginia, there was history before television.)

And I'd love the article, published in Sunday's Cleveland Plain Dealer by TV critic Mark Dawidziak, even if I weren't one of the people quoted. Read on for a link to the story, and more...

Dawidziak's story is called "Jon Stewart Blurs the Line Between Jester and Journalist." Read the full article by clicking HERE.

Then, if you're still in the mood, here's a link to a story I wrote for the Boston Phoenix in 2007, on Stewart's Comedy Central cohort, Stephen Colbert -- a story called Comedy Rambo. Read that one by clicking HERE. And its sidebar, which links Colbert to everyone from Will Rogers to (couldn't help it) Pat Paulsen, by clicking HERE.

The central thesis of all these pieces: These two humorists, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, definitely are to be taken seriously.

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GUEST BLOG #7: P.J. Bednarski Votes Yes to Leno at 10

April 10, 2009 7:00 AM

At this point, our recurring guest columnists are established enough to need no (more) introduction. So here's P.J. Bednarski, with a contrarian -- but very interesting -- take on NBC's decision to import Jay Leno to prime time...

What if Jay Leno actually reinvents NBC's 10 p.m. hour?

By P.J. Bednarski

I hardly ever watch The Tonight Show, and in fact I believe, probably too tenaciously, that Jay Leno ruined the franchise, and his move to 10 p.m. ET will damage Conan O'Brien's chances to create a Tonight Show that will allow him to thrive. For O'Brien, an eminently decent human being, the Leno move proves that Life Is Unfair.

All that said, Jay Leno is funny. I don't think NBC should be crucified for giving him the 10 o'clock show. It's TV critic mantra to say NBC is just using Leno to reduce costs, and that they are sacrificing the time period, and that the network is putting dramatic series in peril by taking away five prime hours where they could have been scheduled. All that is true. And so what? There are about 400 other networks. If NBC has its head up its rear end, well, OK by me.

But I'm not sure the Leno move is such a bad idea.

Let's look at a brighter side. Leno's 10 p.m. show has to be reinvented so that viewers will watch the beginning -- he has no problems with that now at 11:30 -- and stick around for the end -- where right now Leno's Tonight Show loses a lot of its audience. That's a problem for NBC and its affiliates because the 10 p.m. show should crescendo into the 11 o'clock news. In an ideal world (I live there! Let's go swimming!), Leno would be a great lead-in for those hard-pressed newscasts.

Maybe that can happen. Who says Leno at 10 p.m. should even resemble Leno's Tonight Show? Leno and NBC could recreate some blend of The Daily Show, The Carol Burnett Show, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, and, especially, the old Steve Allen late night shows, which had a repertory cast that included, in various guises, Louie Nye, Don Knotts, Bill Dana and Tom Poston.

Those guys created for the time an early platform for nightly sketch comedy; David Letterman learned television, and how to do his show, from following Steve Allen's template, and he has repeatedly paid tribute to the fact, especially on his old NBC show. (Indeed, paranoid Chris Elliott and Larry "Bud" Melman, the elf-like and perfectly inept character often paraded out to the unsuspecting public, were perfect Letterman substitutes for Allen's characters.).

That cast of regulars is not really so different from what Jon Stewart does now. Indeed, age aside, I think if anybody ought to be sweating about Jay Leno at 10 p.m., it's The Daily Show, which stands a good chance of having some of its broader news-breaking satires usurped by Leno an hour earlier.

If the new Leno show opened with his monologue, then segued to the obligatory guest and musical act, and then segued into sketch comedy where he was either absent or involved only peripherally (because he's lousy at it), that would be a show that would have something going for it. Any mix like that could work.

The fact that I've consciously chopped Leno's show into parts doesn't hurt. If viewers don't TiVo, they graze. If NBC saves the best (Leno's monologue) for the beginning and the end (a nightly mini-version of Saturday Night Live, if you will), Leno works. If not a nightly hit, it would at least be a hit some days of the week, which seems to be better than what NBC has now.

While the world is filled with superstars, Leno does a great job of getting name guests that you might want to see if you A) don't have to stay up late, or B) imagine that you'll actually watch on TiVo at some point. This week, guests include Ellen DeGeneres, Halle Berry, Keith Olbermann, Reese Witherspoon and Condoleezza Rice. Musicians include Prince, P.J. Harvey and John Parish, and the incredible Raul Malo, old of the spectacular Mavericks. Out of five days, I could see myself drifting over there perhaps three or four times, particularly if NBC is smart enough to make sure Leno's still on when competitors go to commercials.

All this is a long way to say that WHDH, the Boston affiliate which made headlines in the last few days by announcing it plans to pre-empt Leno for local programming, is making a mistake if it fears Leno at 10 will torpedo its news at 11.

NBC has told WHDH owner Ed Ansin, in essence, to shut up. I'd take that advice because when NBC wants to, it can give wayward affiliates a bad time.

Consider the plight of former NBC affiliate KRON in San Francisco. When, in 2001, Young Broadcasting acquired that station, beating a bid by NBC, the network was so livid it made it almost impossible for KRON, once owned by the San Francisco Chronicle, to remain associated with NBC. Without that affiliation, Young has suffered to the point of bankruptcy, as an indie. Ansin reportedly has protection against that; I wouldn't count on it.

When it comes to money and Leno, NBC is sure to get the last laugh. And as a former Fox general manager told me, why does Ansin think Fox won't continue to dominate the news ratings at that hour?

Maybe the best advice would be for NBC affiliates (and others) to try a little reinvention themselves. At best, they're in a world of alien hairdos and stupid puns. At worst, they're in a world of stupid hairdos, bad puns, insipid weathermen and dumb teaser questions at the commercial breaks.

Jay Leno won't always be the biggest joker in the evening. The news team is coming up.

----

P.J. Bednarski is a veteran TV critic and former executive editor of Broadcasting & Cable magazine.

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Three New Thursday TV Shows, No New Thursday Triumphs

April 8, 2009 8:24 PM

Three new shows premiere tonight, with little cause for celebration. NBC's Parks and Recreation, with Amy Poehler, may develop into something worthwhile, but it's disappointingly derivative. NBC's Southland is even more disappointing, and even more derivative -- and Harper's Island, on CBS, is a bloody mess.

Harper's Island, at 10 ET, is designed as a hybrid of Agatha Christie mysteries and Saw-style torturama movies. It's a mutation that doesn't take -- and even though Harper's Island is envisioned as a miniseries, and designed to unspool with weekly murders until the killer is revealed in July, this series deserves a quick kill.

If NBC lopped off Chopping Block after a single telecast, and CBS dumped Secret Talents of the Stars after one installment, then Harper's Island, too, can leave the airwaves without proving an ending. Sometimes, disappearance is more satisfying than closure, and this is one of those times.

It's not that there isn't a cast member or two who rises above the rest. Cameron Richardson from Point Pleasant, as Chloe, sparkles enough that when she's threatened with death by drowning in the pilot, you hope you haven't seen the last of her. For most of the other characters, and for this series itself, death can't come quickly enough.

It has none of the style of a Christie mystery, and none of the clever writing. Without characters to care about, or stories to draw you in, Harper's Island offers no reason to watch. CBS expects this to be a new way to lure viewers. My guess: It's a new way to lose them.

Southland, premiering at 10 ET on NBC, is much less repugnant. It's just so familiar, it's boring. Benjamin McKenzie, who played Ryan on The O.C., plays a rookie cop on his first day on the force. He's a privileged young man diving into an altruistic job and mixing with common folk. It's the flip side of his O.C. character, but exactly the same as Noah Wyle's Carter character on E.R. -- like Southland, a show with John Wells as executive producer.

This follow-the-rookie approach is nothing new: It was used on St. Elsewhere 25 years ago. But St. Elsewhere pushed the envelope when it did it. Southland is just recycling, and not very dynamically. Some of its teach-the-rookie speeches are laughably over the top, and so are many of the situations and the characters populating them. Nothing original here - and nothing expected to last past fall, when Jay Leno takes over the time slot.

Finally, there's Parks and Recreation, at 8:30 ET. By default, it's the best of the bunch, but it has quite a way to go. Amy Poehler is a proven comic actress, of course, but all of the insistent claims by the cast and creators of this show that it's not like The Office are, in a word, absurd. This couldn't be more like The Office, in tone and execution, unless it were about a rival Pennsylvania paper company.

Parks and Recreation may grow and find its own voice. At least one promo for a future show, in which Poehler's Leslie Knope is stalked by a raccoon indoors, made me laugh. Unfortunately, nothing in tonight's pilot did, not once. I was hoping for more, and expecting it, too.

But I'll keep watching Parks and Recreation, in hopes that it improves. Southland has lost me already -- and the folks behind Harper's Island should be happy Fox has televised at least one installment of Osbournes Reloaded.

That way, Harper's may not end the year as the Worst Show of 2009.

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GUEST BLOG #6: Tom Brinkmoeller Adds 'Scrubs' to List of TV Classics

April 8, 2009 12:58 PM

Tonight's prime-time TV is a very active lineup. One of TV's best current series, ABC's Lost, presents another fresh episode, while NBC's Life, one of that network's best, presents what may be its final gasp. ABC also presents the premiere of a new series, The Unusuals.

But today's guest columnist, Tom Brinkmoeller, shifts our focus to an ABC show, formerly on NBC, that he feels has yet to get its due respect: the veteran medical sitcom Scrubs...

'Scrubs' operates like a TV classic

By Tom Brinkmoeller

There are really bad sitcoms (think Hello, Larry and you may have begun at history's lowest point). There are really funny sitcoms: 30 Rock, Seinfeld, Barney Miller and Taxi get high spots on that long list.

Then there are really amazing half-hour blocks of television that also make you laugh. That list isn't so long. M*A*S*H did it almost weekly for years. A scene could have you laughing, due to the rare blending of great writing and amazing acting skills. A moment later, those same actors, doing lines written by those same fine writers, could make you gasp at the drama, choke up with the depth of the situation, and, until you were led through the heavy and into lighter scenery again, forget the funny lines you had laughed at just moments earlier.

Gary David Goldberg claimed a spot on this special list in 1991 with Brooklyn Bridge, the story of a Jewish family's interactions with their extended family and the changing world around them in 1950s New York. It was a gem of a concept, polished by extraordinary writing and near-perfect casting.

But half-hour series that can tap into that kind of magical mix of humor and true human feeling just don't make it to the air that often. Dream teams make these kinds of programs, and the dynamic of most television programming today has little to do with assembling great talent and making video art. Dreams of pumping money into unscripted series, rather than having to pay writers, top many TV executive wish lists.

Even so, one of those rare entities holds on to network space today. Scrubs, a series that was consistently excellent on its former I-don't-get-it network, NBC, has thrived even more under a friendly ABC roof this season. I can't remember a half-hour series since M*A*S*H that has matched comedy and drama so masterfully for so long a run (Brooklyn Bridge didn't make it through two seasons on CBS).

Last week's episode, "My Full Moon," made me wish I was a member of the Television Academy, so I could give it my acting and writing votes. Set during the overnight shift at the hospital, Elliot (Sarah Chalke) and Turk (Donald Faison) carried about 90 percent of the comedy and drama that made this an exceptional episode of an exceptional series. None of the other first-team members of the cast appeared last week. Watching over this year's unique group of interns as they dealt with a full moon and how its forces can affect hospitals, Turk and Elliot steered the story through lots of really funny situations, and some genuinely touching ones.

One patient was trying to chew off his sutures, and an intern decided the way to stop that action was to put his head in a cone, the way vets do with dogs. Another patient had taken a dangerous substance, but he thought evil doubles were substituting for the medical staff. His way of dealing with the duplicates was to confuse them by telling them different stories of the substance he had taken. Another patient, a very proper woman, couldn't be discharged until she farted -- something she would rather die than do.

All funny situations, all set up and resolved with great skill and many laughs. At the same time, a female patient looked as though she would provide a comedic fourth to the episode. But the writers steered her story into a different vector, and the resulting diagnosis put all the laughs aside and brought a real seriousness that was touching. So was a continuing, sometimes interrupted, conversation between Elliot and Turk about the eight years that have passed since they were new interns and their thoughts about what they would be doing in the future.

The half-hour ended, not with a huge laugh, but with a more rewarding insight into the character Ms. Chalke has made into Elliot during Scrubs' previous seven seasons.

Scrubs executive producer Bill Lawrence often crafts his stories in such ways, and each year he seems to get better at it. (Though I wonder if this small masterpiece even would have seen airtime at the series' former parent network, where a dense designation is a sought-after merit badge.) Usually he uses the whole talented cast to tell his story. This episode isolated only two of them, and the impact was very effective.

When M*A*S*H ended in 1983, the finale was a justifiably major event, and the audience size (106 million) reflected how people valued this special series. I hope that when Scrubs signs off for good this year, some tributes similar to the scores written for M*A*S*H will honor this other life-and-death, hilarious and heart-touching, doctor-and-nurse one-of-a-kind piece of television art.

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Tom writes: For a number of years, Tom Brinkmoeller was paid to watch and write about television. That seemingly ideal situation can't match his current one: Watching only what he enjoys, not being held hostage by a paycheck, and not having to steer a TV story through editors who think watching television impairs the brain as well as social status.

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FX's "Rescue Me" Returns -- Finally, and Brilliantly

April 7, 2009 10:03 AM

The FX drama series Rescue Me, starring Denis Leary as a haunted New York firefighter, has been gone from TV so long, it makes The Sopranos look like a poster boy for prime-time promptness. FX even presented five-minute "mini-sodes" of Rescue Me in the interim, just to remind viewers of what they were missing.

Well, miss no longer. After a hiatus of hour-long episodes that stretches back to 2007, Rescue Me is back, starting tonight at 10 ET. Back, and brilliant.

Denis Leary, who stars as Tommy Gavin, and co-producer Peter Tolan have created a series that started off impressively in 2004, and truly has gotten better and more intense every year. The characters, by now, are fully rounded, even if most of them are, in their own ways, fully certifiable. And watching them, whether they're joking about genitalia or talking seriously about Ground Zero, is just wonderful.

This season begins with lots going on, but there's one element that soars above all others. Michael J. Fox guest stars as Dwight, the new boyfriend of Tommy's ex-wife, Janet -- and the scenes between the two of them are as full of sparks as the firefighting scenes. They're amazing together, expressing an instant mutual dislike. And as good as it is to have Rescue Me back, it's even better to have Fox around again.

Then there's the subplot about an author visiting the firehouse to research a book on 9/11 -- an excuse for many of the characters, including Tommy, to either verbalize or avoid their individual angst. At times, Rescue Me is one of the most dramatic shows on television. At other times, it's one of the funniest, and often makes me laugh out loud. Really laugh. And, really, out loud.

And then, finally, there are the women -- Andrea Roth as Janet, Callie Thorne and Gina Gershon as two of the women in Tommy's life, and plenty more. Put it this way: On this show, the fires aren't the hottest things around.

What a show. What a treat. And what a wait -- but it's over, finally. Dive in.

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With HBO's "In Treatment" and Showtime's "United States of Tara," TV is Great Therapy

April 5, 2009 10:02 AM

HBO's In Treatment begins its second season just as Showtime's United States of Tara concludes its first. Both series are so engrossing, they prove that, in the right hands, TV isn't just good therapy. It's great therapy...

It only takes a few minutes of watching the new cycle of In Treatment to be sucked in totally, and to remember why this drama series, starring Gabriel Byrne as conflicted therapist Paul Weston, is so addictive. It's like a series of off-Broadway plays, or a flashback to those wonderful days of TV's Golden Age, when all you needed for riveting drama was a couple of people sitting around talking. The only thing that could make In Treatment more compelling would be if it were broadcast live.

The writing, acting and direction in In Treatment is so good, you're never aware of the acting, or the artifice. Even John Mahoney, the most familiar face as the unpretentious dad on Frasier, inhabits his role of a wealthy, anxiety-ridden CEO so completely, and so immediately, that you observe him as his character, not as an actor playing one.

And Byrne... does the word magnificent mean anything?

As with last season, In Treatment divides itself into five weekly installments, with a different patient given one of five 30-minute sessions. Unlike last season, these aren't parceled out once nightly, but in clumps, making it easier to stay current or catch up.

This season, the people interacting intensely with Paul are Mia (Hope Davis), whom he visits initially for advice about a pending malpractice lawsuit; April (Alison Pill), a college student with a secret so intense she writes it on a sheet of paper rather than speaking it aloud; Oliver (Aaron Shaw), a pre-teen boy whose parents are divorcing; Walter (the aforementioned Mahoney), a business executive with stress issues; and a weekly reunion with Gina (Dianne Wiest), Paul's mentor. You'll remember each, long after you turn off the TV.

HBO is making it easy to dive in. Even if you didn't see any of last season's shows, this year's batch gets you up to speed without stripping a gear. (Eventually, you'll want to go back and watch season one on DVD, but that's nothing but a big bonus.) And the scheduling, too, is easier to manage.

The first two installments, introducing Mia and April, are shown Sunday night at 9 ET. The next three, with Oliver, Walter and Gina, are shown Monday night at 9 ET, in a triple-header. And all five episodes of Week One are repeated Monday night, beginning at 8 ET.

What could be better? Not much.

"Every patient's therapy is different," Paul tells Mahoney's impatient Walter, who comes to Paul looking for an instant solution to his insomnia, and demanding guidelines on how his treatment is expected to proceed.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Walter replies grumpily, and very, very sarcastically. "We're all unique snowflakes."

Yes, they are, and In Treatment shines a light on each of them without letting them melt. One wonderful thing about this show is that it reveals its mysteries slowly, just as therapy would. Another is that while Paul is very, very good at listening, he's not without some pretty serious issues of his own. Both sides of the equation, in each show's dance of dialogue, is full of meaning and subtext. Even the silences speak volumes. Sometimes, especially the silences.

That's what's so satisfying about Showtime's United States of Tara as well. It's not only Toni Collette's performance as a woman whose consciousness occasionally splinters into various "alters" -- but that the reason for this schism has prove elusive, just as her family's attempts to accept her decision to forego her medication has been played for drama more than laughs.

Showtime presents the season finale Sunday night at 10 ET, so you can shift directly from HBO's In Treatment doubleheader and catch both therapy shows in one giant session. Or you can do the same on Monday: Watch all five installments of In Treatment from 8-10:30 p.m. ET, then jump to Showtime for the 10:30 ET repeat of Tara.

Either way, it's great therapy. And great television. Take full doses of both of these series, and thank me in the morning.

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40 Years Ago -- On April 3, 1969 -- CBS Fired the Smothers Brothers

April 3, 2009 8:49 AM

Okay, I'm obsessed. And I'm writing the final chapters of my book on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, so this date is foremost in my brain right now.

Forty years ago -- on April 3, 1969 -- CBS fired the Smothers Brothers.

Their variety series already had been renewed for a fourth season when CBS pulled the plug. "Fired, not cancelled," is what Tom always says when talking about the show, and it's a crucial distinction. Ostensibly, the brothers were fired for not delivering tapes of their shows in time for preview by affiliates, but what really did them in was using their prime time show to say something that mattered. Or try to.

The show that was pulled by CBS and never shown, the one with the second comic sermonette by David Steinberg, ended with Tom acknowledging something no other prime-time TV was prepared to do that weekend. He noted the first anniversary of the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr., and said, "Let's hope his dream will someday come true."

In prime time, on broadcast TV, that type of political passion from an entertainment program was as rare then as it is now. Back to the book And on days like this, when I realize how singularly brave and important a show Comedy Hour was, I can't get back quickly enough...

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GUEST BLOG #5: Ed Martin on CBS Dimming Its "Guiding Light"

April 2, 2009 8:22 AM

Tonight NBC devotes three hours to a farewell to ER, the drama series it has presented in prime time for 15 years. Yesterday, CBS announced its intention to say goodbye to a daytime institution it has broadcast for nearly five times as long: Guiding Light, a soap opera that predates TV. Its potential imminent demise has prompted a passionate response from our new contributor Ed Martin, whose latest guest column begins like this:

"CBS made history today in a bad way. It cancelled Procter & Gamble Productions' classic soap opera Guiding Light, the longest running scripted franchise in the history of modern media!"

Click to read the full review -- or, to put it another way, to go towards the Light...

CBS Plans to Extinguish Its "Guiding Light"

By Ed Martin

CBS made history today in a bad way. It cancelled Procter & Gamble Productions' classic soap opera Guiding Light, the longest running scripted franchise in the history of modern media!

I have during the last ten years written many times about Guiding Light for Jack Myers Reports and other publications, and whenever possible I used those platforms to remind executives at CBS and P&G that it isn't simply another soap opera -- it's an American institution, and a national treasure at that.

Everyone reading this column has a relative, living or deceased, who either listened to Guiding Light during its run on radio beginning in 1937, or watched it since it transitioned to television in 1952. Its former cast members include James Earl Jones and Calista Flockhart, Kevin Bacon and James Lipton. Some of our parents can actually say that they first enjoyed this show on radio with their parents and still follow it on TV.

It isn't sufficient to refer to this achievement as rare. This is a success story unparalleled in the history of modern media. Think about this: With few exceptions (most notoriously the marathon daily news coverage of the O.J. Simpson double-murder trial), Guiding Light has been in continuous daily production through eight decades! The durability of this franchise makes it way too significant to fall victim to the current recession, when desperate short-term thinking and a sudden scarcity of valuable thought-leadership are making everything worse for all of us.

I understand that these are tough times for soap operas, which are threatening to drop like ducks from the sky during hunting season. Critics blame the storylines, networks cite the numbers, and everybody loses. With a uniquely American success story as noteworthy as Guiding Light the latest to be shot down, it's time for everyone to halt their respective declarations of self-fulfilling damnation and acknowledge what is really going on, and what should happen next.

First, the numbers: With all due respect to the fine folks at Nielsen, daytime audience measurement is, at its very best, irrefutably flawed. We're told that ratings for every soap have been in precipitous decline since the mid-Nineties, but you cannot go anywhere in this country (or dozens of others) and not find people who watch at least one soap opera with some degree of regularity.

The very idea that viewership for soap operas would decline in direct proportion to the ever-expanding increase in viewing options is utter bull****. If there had been mobile viewing devices in the Sixties, millions of people would have watched Dark Shadows on the go, and hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of breathless tweens and teens would not have had to run home from school every day to see the latest installment in the supernatural saga of the Collins family.

And just imagine how much larger the record-holding audience for General Hospital would have been during the fabled Luke and Laura years if young people from grade school to grad school could have watched it on their own terms! We didn't even have VCRs back then!

Second, the storytelling: Yes, there is room for improvement on every soap opera, though I would argue that CBS' Young and the Restless and As the World Turns and ABC's One Life to Live are currently more exciting than they have been in years. As for Guiding Light, its production model was completely redesigned early last year, to mixed results. (P&G saved a lot of money, but the end product looked cheap, at least at the start. There have been improvements since that time.)

Sadly, the show's storytelling hasn't really improved. I'm not going to go into specifics about what should or should not have been done with every character and storyline, but I think it is fair to say that Guiding Light hasn't been as sexy or youthful or suspenseful as it was in the early years of this decade, and that it has lost some of its edge.

Recently, neither veteran Guiding Light viewers nor those all-important young newcomers have been particularly well served. But it is possible to have it both ways. Just check out As the World Turns, which is also produced by P&G and happens to be the second-longest running scripted series in television history.

Rare is the episode of ATWT that does not include dynamic appearances by long-time veteran cast members in their beloved roles, and yet the stories it tells about its younger characters are almost as forward thinking and contemporary as those on MTV's The Real World: Brooklyn, currently the best drama about young people on TV. This is especially true of the tumultuous romance of teens Noah Mayer and Luke Snyder, daytime’s first male super-couple and one of the most popular soap couples in every industry survey, especially among young women.

Many fans are following the story of Luke and Noah on YouTube and elsewhere online, where their scenes are lifted from the rest of the show and repackaged as sequential video clips. (There are almost 300 at present.) Might the networks consider separating out specific stories from all the soaps in this manner on their own Web sites? Would advertisers respond accordingly? This is one small out-of-the-box possibility for the future of soap viewing and packaging, but there must be soaps with which to do so!

Which brings me back to Guiding Light: Are there out-of-the-box opportunities for this venerable property that might rescue it from CBS' death grip? If not, there ought to be. Here's one: How about turning it into a primetime series that runs once a week, 52 weeks a year? I like to think CBS of all networks could pull this off: This mighty broadcaster was once home to Dallas, the most successful primetime serial in television history.

If a pumped up version of the current GL couldn't cut it, how about one in which the detectives and police officers on its canvas are moved to the forefront, thereby turning it into an ongoing serial filled with elements of CBS' successful procedural crime dramas? If that isn't an option, a customized primetime version of GL could be produced for a basic cable network.

I realize we will all survive without Guiding Light. But does it have to die? I can't help wondering: Has the franchise truly run its course, or did it simply fall victim to the mindsets of current executives at CBS and P&G? They're holding history in their hands. Can they handle it?

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Ed Martin is the television critic and programming analyst for the media industry Web site JackMyers.com. The former senior editor of the award-winning, much-missed television and advertising trade magazine Inside Media, Ed has also written for USA Today, Advertising Age, Television Week, Broadcasting & Cable and TV Guide.
Earlier in his career, Ed was publicity director for the independent feature film production and distribution company Vestron Pictures, where he orchestrated publicity campaigns and produced electronic press kits for dozens of movies including the one and only Dirty Dancing. The fact that it is now referred to as a "classic" makes Ed feel old.

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