'Dexter' Keeps Up the Carnage, Spices It With Spirituality

September 30, 2011 8:56 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Showtime's latest publicity artwork for Dexter bills him as an "Avenging Angel" while picturing him in both a crucifixion pose and with bloody wings.

So there's an overriding religious motif at work as Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall) again cuts to the chase while also eluding capture in Season 6 of the pay cable network's longest-running and most successful drama series.

What's the meaning of his life? Will Dexter ever bow to a higher power, other than his still materializing deceased father? Can he get his 2-year-old son, Harrison, into the very exclusive Our Lady of the Gulf preschool after telling its Catholic head nun he's a nonbeliever?

There also are two religious zealots at large, and they do really awful things to their victims in the name of some very twisted form of holy retribution. Add a supposedly reformed ex-convict named Brother Sam, whose blessed-is-the-Lord body shop gives fellow felons second chances. But is he for real? And if so, can Dexter learn something from Brother Sam's latter-day relationship with God?

In this context, it's perhaps hard to believe that Sunday's season opener (9 p.m ET, preceding the new and very much recommended Homeland) comes off as a little sitcom-y at times before later hitting its stride. Episode 2 is the strongest of the three sent for review, mainly because it introduces the complex Brother Sam. He's played with striking effectiveness by Mos, who used to be Mos Def and was born Dante Terrell Smith.

He'll have a season-long arc, as will Edward James Olmos and Colin Hanks (rebooting from Fox's The Good Guys). They're respectively cast as creepy Prof. James Gellar and his pliant disciple, Travis Marshall. What they do to a fruit stand vendor -- all of it off-camera -- makes Dexter's methods of execution seem like time off for good behavior. The remains are left for Miami homicide to pore over.

The sitcom-y reference is to Dexter's 20-year high school reunion, which he attends in hopes of obtaining evidence on a self-absorbed jock whom he suspects of murdering the classmate he married. Largely dismissed as a nebbish during his teen years, Dexter's "prestigious" job as a blood spatter analyst -- plus the grisly loss of his own wife at the end of Season 4 -- combine to make him both a sympathetic figure and sudden hunk to many of his former female classmates.

That's a pretty big stretch. And the episode spends too much time in this rather carnival-like setting before involving the athletically inept Dexter in a comedy-laced flag football game in which he's participating only to obtain a blood sample.

Dexter eventually gets back to basics, but can't resist another dose of religious symbolism. The killer classmate, who has a big Jesus tattoo on his chest, pleads for mercy by falling back on his "faith." That's not going to go very far with an atheist.

Episode 2 is appreciably better. And the third hour includes a sterling guest shot by the redoubtable Ronny Cox, who plays an embittered retirement home coot with a sordid past and a dead-end future.

Dexter otherwise takes comfort in a nightly bedtime ritual with his son. First a little bubble bath, followed by some play activities and, initially, little Harrison's favorite "monster" story.

All of the cop shop principals, including Jennifer Carpenter as the title character's sister, Debra, are reassembled and given new obstacles to overcome. There's no lack of one-on-one scenes with Dexter and Debra, even though in real-life, Hall and Carpenter filed for divorce late last year after meeting on the set of the show and marrying in 2008. Their on-screen chemistry seems to still be in good working order.

Dexter likewise remains in solid shape, with new characters generating some additional heat while its namesake keeps plying his trade. It's always been a series unlike any other. And for those who swear by it, Dexter is still ably postponing its inevitable end-game with story lines that just won't let it quit.

GRADE: A-

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NBC's 'Prime Suspect' Is an Applause-Worthy Encore

September 22, 2011 3:33 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

How dare they try to do a new Prime Suspect series without Helen Mirren as put-upon, hard-boiled London detective Jane Tennison?

Well, NBC takes that dare Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and does a very decent job of it, in a Manhattan-based version starring Pennsylvanian Maria Bello as tough-minded detective Jane Timoney.

Renaming her a bit doesn't seem all that necessary. Not that it's of any capital concern once Bello gets rolling. She's convincingly ambitious and resilient from the start, when her biggest adversary is the cigarette-smoking she's just given up.

We first see her jogging, coughing, spitting and chewing nicotine gum before having a set-to with a recalcitrant cab driver. Then it's on to the featured crime scene, which is thoroughly and graphically blood-soaked.

And of course the victim is a woman, because research tells the networks that viewers will be more "invested" in catching the perpetrator if his prey is considered more vulnerable or sympathetic. Unfortunately, the number of women murdered in the name of various crime shows -- added to the number of little girls kidnapped -- has long ago overstepped the boundaries of exploitation. Whatever the overall quality of Prime Suspect, it's same old/same old in that respect. The depictions of the corpses, as well as the descriptions of what's been done to them, should also be cause for concern. Unfortunately, though, there's no statute of limitations on this.

Back at the Prime Suspect cop shop, the resident boys club still considers Timoney the enemy. Rumors that she slept her way into a transfer have prompted some of the animosity. It still seems at least a little overplayed, though, even if Timoney has an ally in Lt. Kevin Sweeney (solid work by Aidan Quinn, at left in photo above). He's the department boss, trying to exercise a firm hand while also allowing his personal office to be an ad hoc bar where the men drink jumbo shots of straight liquor from cartoon-emblazoned jelly jars.

Timoney finds herself running in place until one of these guys drops dead from a heart attack. She brazenly lobbies for his cases, and pisses Sweeney off before he gives them to her.

The opening episode has been reworked from the original pilot to all but eliminate a side case involving a woman thrown from the roof of a building. Timoney instead turns her energies toward solving the serial rapist case (with colleague Kirk Acevedo, pictured below).

She sometimes wears a smallish fedora while working the street. From this perspective it's an odd distraction. But Kojak had his lollipops and Columbo his rumpled raincoat. So we'll see.

Timoney also lives with a guy named Matt (Kenny Johnson) and has time to visit her supportive pop, Desmond (Peter Gerety). The denouement in Thursday's opening episode leaves her strikingly bloodied for a woman detective. Her first question of a fellow cop: "Do you have a cigarette?"

Co-executive producer and pilot director Peter Berg brought Friday Night Lights to the small screen, so he's not afraid of TV adaptations. His drama series invariably look "authentic." And Prime Suspect is studiously gritty.

Bello's performance is the prime reason to watch, though. She's got the chops to succeed Mirren, even if she never surpasses her. The best new crime drama of the fall season doesn't necessarily have to be an original idea. It just has to have the right people in place.

GRADE: B+

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'Whitney' Gets Off to a Smart 'n' Snappy Start

September 22, 2011 1:18 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

NBC has branded Whitney Cummings this fall's "It" girl. This doesn't necessarily mean she's the best thing about the new sitcom Whitney (Thursday at 9:30 p.m. ET), although she's still quite a bit better than good.

The revelation here is Chris D'Elia, who plays Whitney's live-in boyfriend, Alex. He's the low-key, but quick-with-a-quip anchor of a series in which the title character and her two likewise high-strung girlfriends are far less likely to tone it down.

D'Elia, who like Cummings comes from the standup comedy world, is a solid delivery man when it comes to making the most of his somewhat secondary role. At a wedding reception, for instance, Whitney is caught in the act of prematurely glomming onto the cupcakes after earlier being talked out of wearing white. (She then wears yellow. Which happens to be the bride's chosen color.)

"Wow, you're on fire tonight," D'Elia's Alex notes. "What are you closing with -- blackface?"

The two of them have been together for three years, with no inclination to become Mr. and Mrs. Her parents have both been divorced three times, so it's Whitney's opinion that "getting married is so dumb." Alex is more than OK with that, although their lax sex life could use a little boost. Or at least Whitney feels that way, prompting her to wear a naughty nurse's outfit to surprise Alex when he returns home. First, though, he'll have to fill out the patient forms. It's a funny bit, and you're probably assuming it doesn't end well.

It doesn't.

Cummings, whose career began catching fire on the E! network's Chelsea Lately, is very busy this fall. She's also the co-creator and executive producer of CBS' 2 Broke Girls, which rocked the ratings with a Monday premiere that capitalized on the coattails of the preceding debut of Ashton Kutcher as Charlie Sheen's replacement on Two and a Half Men.

Whitney, the only NBC comedy with a studio audience and attendant crowd laughs, is slotted after The Office on Thursday nights. So it's also following a show in transition, with James Spader stepping in to fill the void left by Steve Carell.

Cummings has nowhere near the acting experience of any of the aforementioned stars. But she acquits herself well in the Whitney opener, with D'Elia landing some welcome softer punchlines. How nice it is to have a guy who's neither a shouter nor a whiner.

Sitcoms also can rise and fall on the strength of their supporting players. Whitney's so far/so good gal pals include a sardonic divorcee named Roxie (Rhea Seehorn, in photo above) and the much sunnier Lily (Zoe Lister-Jones), who's proud of her frequent sex with boyfriend Neal (Maulik Pancholy). A rather tiresome would-be playuh named Mark (Dan O'Brien, in photo above) rounds out the ensemble. He's also a cop.

The premiere episode for the most part is snappily written and bracingly vibrant. And D'Elia can be relied on to take it down a notch when needed. It all makes for a promising start on a network whose best comedies invariably wind up on Thursday nights. Whitney is already there, and looks as though it just might belong.

GRADE: B+

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Funny Thing About These Jokes . . .

September 17, 2011 10:35 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Some things just shouldn't be joked about, particularly on network TV sitcoms seen by millions.

Humor is subjective, of course. And political correctness can be insidious when taken too far, as it often is.

But among the hundreds of one-liners in this fall's new crop of comedies, I'm still wondering about two of them. From this perspective, both easily could be dropped without compromising the "integrity" or varnishing the "edge" off their respective carriers -- CBS's 2 Broke Girls and ABC's Last Man Standing. So I asked about them during mass interview sessions for these shows at the recent Television Critics Association press tour.

In the pilot for 2 Broke Girls, a greasy spoon cashier played by charter Saturday Night Live cast member Garrett Morris jokes that a new waitress is "workin' harder than Stephen Hawking trying to put on a pair of cufflinks."

And in the opener for Last Man Standing, Tim Allen decides against dropping off his little grandson, Boyd, at what he later terms a "hippie hippie rainbow" learning center. He then tells his single-parent oldest daughter, "I just don't think your kid should go to that school. You know how that ends up. Boyd dancin' on a float."

Hawking, the eminent physicist and cosmologist, is now almost completely paralyzed after being diagnosed as a young man with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. And the clear implication of Allen's joke is that Boyd might end up gay if he spends too much time in an "unmanly" environment.

Hawking's achievements are both incredible and inspirational. As his disease progresses, is such a ham-fisted joke at his expense really necessary?

And whether he's "in character" or not, should Allen be throwing out a cheap gay joke in times when bullying and hate crimes are still very much in the news?

Allen seemed surprised when I asked whether he was going to leave that joke in there. But to his credit, he took the question seriously.

"Hmm, here's some thin ice right here," he began. "I think it's a funny joke, and I don't think the intent was to offend anybody. So I believe the network will probably leave it in there, but I don't know . . . political sensibilities being what they are."

Allen also didn't try to pretend that the joke wasn't aimed at a particular target. "I don't think we can safely hide behind 'What are you talking about?' " he said. "A lot of people dance on floats. Haven't you seen the Macy's parade? Now obviously if you go to Santa Monica Boulevard, it's a different kind of float. But it [the joke] wasn't meant to be offensive. It was meant to be a reflection on this guy's limited perspective."

At the 2 Broke Girls session, my question about the Hawking joke was handled by the show's co-executive producer, Michael Patrick King. He's openly gay and earned fame and fortune as the principal showrunner for HBO's Sex and the City.

"Yeah, I think it's funny. I'm sorry," he said when asked if it will stay in. "The show will have an edge. And from joke to joke, you will either think it's funny or not. Our job is to make people laugh and be surprised. So if you cannot like that joke [about Hawking], I understand why. But we will always reach for comedy."

Both jokes are a reach, all right. And they should hit the cutting room floor because there's really no defensible reason for either of them.

At least that's how I feel about it. But maybe that's just me. How about you?

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CW's 'H8R' Just Might Leave You Giddy With Guilty Pleasure

September 14, 2011 12:32 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Most pseudo-celebrities just can't get enough of themselves. Marching straight to the head of that class is Dallas-born Jake Pavelka, the pilot turned "fame whore" in the words of fellow fame whore Vienna Girardi.

Their made-for-TV love story on ABC's The Bachelor led to an acidic, tabloid-trumpeted breakup shortly after Pavelka got voted off the network's Dancing with the Stars. A staged one-on-one confrontation during a subsequent ABC special then led to Girardi leaving in tears after Pavelka sort of yelled at her.

He recently segued to ABC's Bachelor Pad, where Girardi and her new made-for-TV love, callow Kasey Kahl, roundly denounced him as a phony, lying poser. Pavelka tried to play a gallant apologetic Sir Galahad before his fellow contestants knocked him off the show.

Now comes The CW's new H8R (short for "Hater"), where Wednesday's opening episode finds -- pause, one-two -- the ubiquitous Pavelka and fellow "reality" show creation Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi confronting commoners who think they're garbage.

H8R aims to convert these heretofore anonymous cheap-shotters into at least semi-fans of their targets. It's Celebrity Rehab in open spaces with drinking allowed. And during an extremely weak moment, your friendly content provider is going to admit that this steaming pile turns out to be guilty pleasure-approved, even if it's almost assuredly all an act on the part of everyone. That includes a genial and sometimes giddy Mario Lopez. He's the host, slumming from Extra. Or is it vice-versa?

Snooki is first at bat. Her hater, a pudgy guy named Nick, supposedly thought he was auditioning for a new "pop culture" TV show. So he feels free to denounce Snooki as a "drunken donkey" among other things while the "pint-size powder keg" of Jersey Shore watches from a secret control room.

She later bursts into a bar where a supposedly shocked Nick is playing pool with a pal. "You are a bully. You are a [bleeping] bully," Snooki informs him after he initially stammers about.

"Clearly you were not expecting this," Lopez later tells Nick, who probably was but had signed a contract to play along. Anyhoo, they end up going grocery shopping for a big sit-down dinner with Nick's family. Snooki says she'll be making chicken cutlets for the whole bunch of 'em, just like she does with her mom on Sunday nights. During the course of this little adventure, Snooki introduces Nick to the pleasures of a big pickle. "You have to suck on it," she instructs him before demonstrating. It could not be determined whether the pickle had been circumcised.

Let's just say that Snooki wins out in the end, and there's some fun to be had in getting to this point. But Pavelka is a ridiculous spectacle throughout, whether he's more or less addressing rumors that he's gay or lamenting to Lopez, "Story of my life. People passing judgment and they don't even know me." The host then bills him as "one of the most hated men in America" before introducing him to his designated H8R, a young blonde named Danielle.

Performing like a trained seal, a topless Pavelka follows Lopez's instructions to first portray himself as a vain jerk while Danielle sits poolside.

"Your job is to go out there and act like the Jake Pavelka that she hates," Lopez tells him. It's a bit hard imagining John Barrymore or even Joey Lawrence acquiescing to something like this. But one gets the feeling that Pavelka will do just about anything at this point to keep himself in front of a camera. Or hear anything, too. Because Danielle repeatedly calls him a "douche" (as well as a "creep" and a "pervert") while H8R's supposedly hidden cameras capture all the action and play it back to Pavelka.

"Some of the stuff I've read, I wouldn't like me either," he says lamely. "And she deserves to know the truth."

Not to give everything away -- oh hell, why not? -- but Pavelka takes all of this guff and comes back for more. He also takes Danielle on a plane ride, escorts her to the real Bachelor mansion and claims he had a troubled relationship with his father in hopes of turning her into an admirer of his. But all he gets is this in the end: "He's arrogant. He obviously thinks his [bleep] don't stink. And it does."

H8R hardly smells like a rose. Still, there's a good solid traffic wreck of a show here, with Snooki actually managing to renovate herself just a bit while Pavelka sinks deeper into his role as America's sad sack punching bag.

Future episodes promise to involve the likes of a few celebrities with actual accomplishments -- Eva Longoria, Charles Barkley, Maksim Chmerkovskiy -- while also revisiting the reality heap to put haters in close proximity to Kim Kardashian and that dope from The Hills.

Damned if the dumb thing isn't going to be on my DVR.

GRADE: C

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Fall Season Again Flies Cable's Colors

September 9, 2011 10:49 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Another new fall season is nigh. But is excitement running high?

There's rhyme and reason leading into this basic deduction. If you're hooked up to cable or a satellite dish, then the possibilities are sky high. If not, the new offerings by the five broadcast networks again are mostly nothing to run home about.

ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC and The CW again are rolling out plenty of new models. And not all of them are clunkers, particularly on the comedy front.

Still, there are no instant natural highs on the order of Lost, 30 Rock, Modern Family, The Good Wife, Desperate Housewives and Heroes. All were laudable fall newcomers of relatively recent vintage. It felt good jumping immediately on their bandwagons, even though Heroes couldn't stand the test of time -- and horrible NBC scheduling -- while DH devolved from a lip-smacking whodunit to a theater of the absurd.

There's certainly some potential this fall in Fox's New Girl and Terra Nova; CBS's 2 Broke Girls, and NBC's Whitney and Prime Suspect. Maybe they'll all bloom and grow. But don't expect much from the heavily publicized retro trio of NBC's The Playboy Club and ABC's Pan Am and Charlie's Angels. Brave new worlds? No chance, although Pan Am at least gets some style points.

The fall cable picture again is infinitely brighter, with five new scripted series standing out while three standouts start anew. HBO's Boardwalk Empire begins its second season on Sept. 25, Showtime's Dexter enters Season 6 on Oct. 2, and AMC's The Walking Dead brings its sophomore year to life on Oct. 16. They have a combined 26 Emmy nominations going into Sept. 18's prime-time ceremony on Fox.

The five new and very noteworthy cable drama series seem like locks for future awards ceremonies. Two are at the head of my fall class.

Showtime's Homeland, which launches Oct. 2 after Dexter, is a contemporary political mystery/thriller with a Manchurian Candidate feel. It stars Damian Lewis (from NBC's underappreciated Life) as a presumed-dead Marine sergeant who's discovered in captivity in Iraq, and Claire Danes (an Emmy winner for HBO's Temple Grandin) in the role of a mentally unstable CIA agent who thinks he may have been "turned." The first episode is both enthralling and refreshingly easy to grasp, with the still young Danes [photo above] again showing why she's among the very best actresses of her generation.

HBO's Enlightened showcases Laura Dern as an executive for a health and beauty company whose workplace affair and subsequent meltdown send her in search of a "higher self." She emerges from a Hawaii healing facility with a not entirely blissed-out determination to be "an agent of change." It may sound sappy, but it decidedly is not. Dern is terrifically compelling, with strong support from Diane Ladd (Dern's real-life mother, playing her mother) and Luke Wilson as her drug-enamored ex-husband. Episodes are only a half-hour, but Enlightened primarily plays like a drama.

Three other cable dramas likewise have airs of distinction.

Starz's Boss, scheduled to premiere Oct. 21, affords Kelsey Grammer [photo at top] a chance to curse and throw his weight around in his first-ever weekly dramatic role. Judging from the first two episodes, he'll be succeeding beyond expectation as iron-fisted Chicago mayor Tom Kane. Besides running the city, he's running scared from a newly diagnosed, rare and incurable disease that his doctor says will be the death of him within three to five years. So there's a new sense of urgency to Kane's governance, with Grammer and a solid supporting cast giving Boss the big shoulders it needs.

FX's American Horror Story, set for an Oct. 5 premiere, puts stars Connie Britton (Friday Night Lights) and Dylan McDermott (The Practice) on a thrill ride devised by Glee and Nip/Tuck creator Ryan Murphy. Following his marital infidelity, they move across the country and end up in a stately but spooky house bought at a bargain price. Jessica Lange again steals scenes with ease, this time as a willful, imposing next-door neighbor. The pilot was shown on a big screen on the Fox lot at the recent Television Critics Association press tour. It definitely got everybody's attention, starting with the distinctly different opening credits. This may or may not pan out as a sustainable weekly series. But for now it's one scary SOB.

Finally there's AMC's Hell on Wheels, a post-Civil War western riding into view Nov. 6. Despite all the buzz and awards for Mad Men and Breaking Bad, AMC's most-watched attraction ever is still 2006's two-part Broken Trail, which starred the tall-in-the-saddle duo of Robert Duvall and Thomas Haden Church.

So the network wanted to try its hand with a weekly horse opera. This one chronicles the building of the transcontinental railroad, and all of the subterfuge and violence that went with it. Relative newcomer Anson Mount cuts an imposing figure as a former Confederate soldier with festering scores to settle. The first episode has scope and grit, but not the instant giddyup of HBO's Deadwood. Still, it shows strong signs of earning its spurs.

Full reviews of all the new fall series, on both cable and broadcast TV, will be coming along as the season unfolds. But prime time's thoroughbreds are on cable. Meanwhile, the free, over-the-air networks again demonstrate that you get what you pay for. Maybe next year.

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MSNBC's Sharpton Hire Gives It Yet Another Left Hook

August 27, 2011 6:07 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

MSNBC's concerted tilt to the left just got more top-heavy with the official addition of the Rev. Al Sharpton as the network's newest full-time host.

Sharpton, who has been auditioning for the past two months in MSNBC's 6 p.m. ET slot, will begin helming the new PoliticsNation at that hour this Monday (Aug. 29).

The heat-seeking firebrand joins a roster of like-minded politicos who already have their own shows. Sequentially from 7 to 11 p.m. ET, they are Chris Matthews, Lawrence O'Donnell, Rachel Maddow and Ed Schultz.

MSNBC president Phil Griffin, who made the announcement Tuesday, said that Sharpton has "always been one of our most thoughtful and entertaining guests. I'm thrilled that he's now reached a point in his career where he's able to devote himself to hosting a nightly show."

Sharpton pronounced himself "very happy and honored to join the MSNBC team as we collectively try to get America to 'Lean Forward.' It is a natural extension of my life work and growth."

In reality, "Lean Forward" means "Lean Left" in the same way that arch rival Fox News Channel's long-entrenched "Fair and Balanced" slogan really means "Fair to the Far Right." But MSNBC clearly has FNC outnumbered at this point in terms of weeknight hosts with unwavering political views.

In a recent chat with a small circle of writers during this month's Television Critics Association press tour, Griffin emphasized that "the media landscape's changed. You've got to stand for something. This idea that you're going to be distant and unemotional in a world where there are so many media outlets -- you can do it, but . . . " His voice then trailed off rather than finish the obvious point that has caused NBC News anchor Brian Williams and his predecessor, Tom Brokaw, to distance themselves from MSNBC, rather than be seen as part of an obvious and growing partisan crowd.

In an earlier press conference with TV writers, Griffin said that his network has now trained its sights on FNC after consistently beating the comparatively down-the-middle CNN in the prime-time Nielsen ratings. "For the first time," he said, "we are beginning to chip away at Fox News Channel."

But at what price to the public discourse in times when compromising and reaching a middle ground increasingly are dirty words in both Washington and in the all-our war between MSNBC and FNC? Republican presidential candidates are mostly buffoons on MSNBC and thoughtful alternatives to President Obama on FNC. There's basically next to no in-between, with Sharpton for one inviting a token Republican on his show every night for the sole purpose of ridiculing and/or talking over that person.

"I think it's easy to caricature us as the opposite of Fox, but I don't really think we live up to the caricature," said Maddow, who joined Griffin, Matthews and O'Donnell on the press tour's MSNBC panel. "I think that there is a lot more nuance and more unpredictability on our side . . . They [FNC] really are pushing a party line, not every one of their hosts, but in the vast majority of their coverage. I think we are more unpredictable."

Matthews said he even voted for George W. Bush in the 2000 presidential election because "I thought he'd have some common sense instead of be taken over by these bookish right-wingers that introduced him to this neo-con crap, and he got sold on it."

At an earlier press tour session, CNN flagbearer Anderson Cooper noted "it's not an easy thing that CNN is trying to do" -- namely report the news with at least a semblance of old-school objectivity. "When a big event happens, people turn to CNN because they know not only are they going to have people there covering it, but they're going to cover it in a way that's non-partisan, that's not left or right. When there's not a big news event, that's when the ratings dip and it becomes more difficult for CNN . . . When you're not trying to be partisan but when you're trying to be aggressive just about the facts and what is true, it's often not as entertaining as some of the others -- and they [CNN] have had some trouble with it."

Cooper will be launching his new syndicated daytime talk show Anderson on Sept. 12. (Check local listings.) On CNN, meanwhile, his presence will be expanded to twice nightly with an 8 p.m. ET first-run of Anderson Cooper 360 and a 10 p.m. ET repeat.

MSNBC's Griffin gives every indication that he won't be paying much attention to anything CNN does in prime-time, even though he predicts that someday "they'll be back" as a strong ratings contender. Meanwhile, the "progressive attitude" continues to bloom and grow at MSNBC, with Sharpton the latest to take offense at anything the political right says or does.

It's a network where Matthews can happily call Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney "a mood ring" before adding, "I look at 'Chet,' whatever that guy's name is -- Rick Perry. He ought to be a Chet . . . I don't know what he is exactly, but I don't think he's authentic."

Perry and thrust/parry and thrust. What a country we're becoming.

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'The Hour' Is So Good, It's Not Long Enough

August 15, 2011 5:06 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Intelligent, suspenseful and stylish through and through, The Hour has just one shortcoming.

BBC America didn't send enough episodes. Four of the six were made available for review and devoured in one sitting. So the central mysteries of this mid-1950s period piece are still very much at large for everyone except those who watched The Hour during its earlier United Kingdom airing.

It's hoped that creator/writer Abi Morgan will prove adept at resolving everything satisfactorily. If so, this is one of the best drama series of the year. And even if not, the acting and atmospherics have been quite something to see so far. Pip pip and bravo, too.

"The Hour" also is the name of a 60 Minutes-esque TV news magazine that's launched in 1956 as a dig-deep alternative to the generic newsreel programs of the day.

Producer Bel Rowley (Romola Garai) and lippy, temperamental reporter Freddie Lyon (Ben Whishaw) have worked together on the stuffy old predecessor while also being close but platonic confidants off-screen. Freddie, a young wisp of a man, aspires to anchor "The Hour," which Bel has been picked to produce. But the position instead is given to the square-shouldered and more mature looking Hector Madden (Dominic West from HBO's The Wire). An unwieldy triangle emerges, with a jealous Freddie playing hard to get before finally signing on near the end of Wednesday's opening one-hour episode.

"I'm looking forward to working with you," Hector tells him.

"At least that makes one of us," Freddie jabs back.

The fits and starts of getting the new program off the ground are intercut with Freddie's dogged investigation of what he believes to be two murders -- of a highly regarded academic and a young woman named Ruthie (Vanessa Kirby) whom he used to know as a kid. Before her demise, she re-establishes contact with Freddie and whispers, "They will kill me if they know I'm talking to you."

But who are "they?" Might they be Cold War-era spies or sinister members of the British government? Is there another network out there besides the BBC, which carries "The Hour"?

Freddie's detective work, which perhaps fittingly includes the bribing of a cop, continues apace while Bel and the married Hector are growingly attracted to one another. The real-life "nationalization" of the Suez Canal Company by Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser is also part of the plot. "The Hour's" up-to-the-minute reporting of the crisis puts it at odds with the British government, which along with France is the canal's principal shareholder.

This all sounds like a pretty dense thicket, and it's true that close attention should be paid. But the story unfolds clearly if sometimes leisurely while the performances, particularly by Whishaw, grow stronger by the hour. He's cocky but thoroughly winning, never more so than when asking/telling one of his middle-aged bosses, "Do you want to die knowing you're always a 'yes man?' "

Viewers craving a satisfying gourmet meal rather than another summertime "reality" Moon Pie are urged to make The Hour a Wednesday night ritual for the next six weeks. The only caveat is whether it will all come out plausibly in the end.

At the two-thirds mark, all systems are go.

GRADE: A (based on the first four episodes)

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George Lopez: Tonight, But No Tomorrow

August 11, 2011 8:01 PM

By Ed Bark

George Lopez played the good soldier. Now he's paying the price.

TBS abruptly canceled the veteran comic's Lopez Tonight Wednesday, with his final fresh hour airing Thursday. In a statement, the network said it had "reached the difficult decision not to order a third season" of the show, which premiered on Nov. 9, 2009 at 11 p.m. ET before the arrival of Conan O'Brien's Conan pushed Lopez back to midnight ET last November.

"We are proud to have partnered with George Lopez, who is an immensely talented comedian and entertainer," TBS said.

Lopez publicly supported both the hiring of O'Brien and the loss of his earlier time slot to the red-headed former Tonight Show host. But as O'Brien's ratings began slipping from their initial highs, so did Lopez's.

In this year's May "sweeps" Nielsen ratings, Lopez Tonight ranked 10th in the key 18-to-49 ratings for late night broadcast and cable programming, averaging 295,000 per show in the age range while Conan placed 8th with 701,000. Both were distant also-rans to Jon Stewart's The Daily Show on Comedy Central, which finished No. 1 in the category with an average of 1.344 million viewers.

In January, Conan was riding higher with an average of 811,000 viewers in the 18-to-49 age range while Lopez Tonight also fared better with 382,000.

Both shows also have been dropping off in total viewers. Conan averaged 1.123 million in January, doubling Lopez Tonight's 556,000. In May, those numbers respectively fell to 975,000 and 451,000 while Stewart's Daily Show soared to 2.337 million compared to January's 1.556 million.

During a set visit in January, Lopez told TV critics that he "was not unhappy about the move (to a later hour) or with Conan coming to TBS. I like it . . . This could be a nice partnership that will last a long time. Listen, they don't put in air-conditioning this extravagant for a show that's not going to be around a long time. I want to be the last face people see before they pass out with their televisions on."

Lopez prided himself on the diversity of his guest list and his show's party atmosphere. But now the party's over, with O'Brien certain to get part of the blame for displacing Lopez Tonight and no doubt hastening its demise.

Lopez's scheduled guests Thursday are Raven-Symone, Slash and comic Auggie Smith. But look for some unannounced drop-ins as the cancelation continues to reverberate.

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The Old Man at Sea

July 19, 2011 8:11 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Just what Rupert Murdoch needed -- a shaving cream pie to the puss.

Actually, it may have been exactly what he needed to perhaps gain a little sympathy after a long Tuesday morning (U.S. time) of taking no direct responsibility for the phone-hacking scandal bedeviling his far-flung world News Corporation.

Murdoch, 80, initially came off as befuddled, sometimes belligerent and almost blindingly out of the loop regarding events that led to his appearance before a Parliamentary committee. The testimony of Rupert and his 38-year-old son, James, was carried live in its entirety on an array of cable news networks that included CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, BBC World News, Current and the Murdochs' Fox News Channel.

"This is the most humble day of my life," Rupert said at both the open and close of an almost three-hour hearing that was marred down the stretch by a male spectator who managed to breach whatever security there was and hit the media baron in the face with a tin full of shaving cream. Viewers never got a full frontal view of the aftereffects, but did see Murdoch's wife, Wendi Deng, 37 years his junior, literally launch herself at the attacker.

A 15-minute recess ensued, with the Murdochs then showered with apologies and praise for their willingness to proceed. "Mr. Murdoch, your wife has a very good left hook," said committee member Tom Watson.

In a way, the Murdochs couldn't have scripted it any better. Instead of egg on his face, Rupert briefly absorbed some cleansing shaving cream instead. Still, the overall impression taken from this worldwide TV stage show is that the elder Murdoch has reached the point where he's fit to be no more than a caretaker for his media empire.

In the early going, son James frequently tried to interject in the interest of protecting his father. And Rupert himself likewise sought to defer to his heir apparent, telling the aggressive Watson, "I think maybe that's a question, again, for James."

But Watson kept redirecting back to Rupert, at one point tellingly rebuffing James when he again sought to interrupt.

"It's revealing in itself what he [Rupert] doesn't know and what executives declined to tell him," Watson deduced.

The son oftentimes gave expansive answers, although many of them were couched with his morning-long disclaimer that "I have no direct knowledge."

Both Murdochs apologized again and again, but Rupert otherwise held himself blameless.

"Do you accept that ultimately you are responsible for this whole fiasco?" committee member Jim Sheridan asked him.

"No," Rupert said bluntly. He instead blamed "the people that I trusted to run it [primarily the now shuttered News of the World newspaper] and then maybe the people that they trusted." The bucks reside in his wallet, but the buck stops short of him.

Murdoch also was pressed on how often he spoke to editors of his various newspapers. He "very seldom" spoke to anyone with News of the World and has his most regular contact with editors of The Wall Street Journal, Rupert said.

"I'm not really in touch," he added, inadvertently speaking volumes while in fact only referring to the newspapers he owns. Arch enemy MSNBC, which can be expected to pound the Murdochs to pulps during its analysis of the hearing, quickly and childishly put up an out-of-context "Rupert Murdoch: I'm not really in touch" banner during its live coverage. And during the break after the shaving cream incident, a British analyst for CNN ridiculed James as talking in "his rather management-speak Donald Duck accent."

CNN personality Piers Morgan, who once served as editor of News of the World (1994-95) and another Murdoch paper, The Daily Mirror (1995-2004), for the most part defended his old boss during Monday's edition of Piers Morgan Tonight. It was the first time he had publicly commented on the phone-hacking scandal.

"For the record, I do not believe that any story that we published in either title was ever gained in an unlawful manner," Morgan said on his program.

But during Tuesday's Parliamentary hearing, committee member Louise Mensch dropped Morgan's name and quoted him as saying in his 2005 book, The Insider: Private Diaries of a Scandalous Decade, "that that little trick of entering a standard 4-digit code allowed anyone to call a number and hear all your messages."

"In that book," Mensch added, "he [Morgan] boasted that 'using that little trick' enabled him to win 'Scoop of the Year' on a story about [former English soccer manager] Sven-Goran Eriksson."

Neither Murdoch commented directly on the allegation while Morgan was quick to deny it as "complete nonsense" via a Twitter retort that was posted on cnn.com, among other outlets.

"I've never hacked a phone, told anyone to hack a phone, or published any stories based on the hacking of a phone," Morgan tweeted.

What a tangled world we live in. But Mensch then hit the motherlode, and got at the essence of how Rupert Murdoch intends to proceed by asking him point blank: "Mr. Murdoch, have you considered resigning?"

"No," he answered.

"Why not?" she asked.

Murdoch said it was because the people who betrayed him were at fault. "It's for them to pay. I think that frankly I'm the best person to clean this up."

Charitably put, the elder Murdoch gave absolutely no evidence of being Mr. Clean-up during Tuesday's hearing. Instead he came off as disengaged and distanced, rather than a hands-on captain of his many ships. What we saw firsthand was a very ancient mariner without a compass.

Son James, who appears to be a bit more on the ball these days, built a wall of deniability around him by repeatedly claiming "no knowledge" of key events in the scandal until after others had blown the whistle.

Both pledged to do better, of course. And by the way, they're really, really sorry.

"Things must be put right," Rupert said. "No excuses."

Until the next time. And in that respect, the Murdochs aren't much different than any other corporate titans. Tuesday morning's pre-choreographed display of contrition with little admission is pretty much the way of the world. And it's only getting worse.

All in all, though, it made for reasonably "good television," with some members of Parliament standing out with their aggressive questioning while others pretty much fumbled about. A pie in the face added a little Three Stooges ambience before the Murdochs returned to be told that "it is extremely good of you to agree to continue this session."

No, it wasn't. Not really. Rupert still hadn't yet read his prepared act of contrition, which the committee had asked him to save for the end. Mere shaving cream -- let alone a gooey cherry pie -- weren't about to deny him his big finish.

Read more from Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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Mr. 'No Spin Zone' Rolls Over

July 19, 2011 3:12 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Mum's the word that most Brits use when talking about their moms.

Mum's also mostly been the word at Fox News Channel, whose two main prime-time personalities -- Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity -- so far have yet to even mention the far-flung phone-hacking scandal that's engulfed Great Britain and world News Corporation chieftain Rupert Murdoch. Along with his son, James, he testified before a Parliamentary committee Tuesday. Murdoch owns Fox News Channel as well as an array of U.S. broadcast stations in major cities.

Murdoch's travails abroad are hardly inconsequential. His planned expansions of his media empire have been put on hold in the wake of the scandal. And Sunday brought both the resignation of the tarnished head of Scotland Yard and the arrest of Murdoch's right-hand woman, Rebekah Brooks, former chief executive of his News International. [Photo of Brooks with Rupert and James Murdoch at right.]

In fact, a high-level arrest or resignation seems to occur daily, even in the aftermath of Murdoch's decision to shut down his so-called "World's Greatest Newspaper," the sleazy tabloid News of the World, after 168 years of junk journalism. He's also belatedly said he's sorry via full-page apologies in other newspapers he owns. Those came only after he hired a damage-controlling PR firm.

Murdoch's only stateside interview so far has been with The Wall Street Journal, which he also owns. Only "minor mistakes" were made, he said in remarks published July 14. The newspaper then blasted Murdoch's critics in a Monday, July 18 editorial.

Let's be evenhanded, though. The New York Times has gleefully pounced on Murdoch's travails with daily front page stories and usually a full page of coverage inside. All well and good, perhaps. But the newspaper's executive editor, Bill Keller, previously had put his reporters in an awkward position by declaring at a New York Press Club event: "I think if you're a regular viewer of Fox News, you're among the most cynical people on planet earth. I cannot think of a more cynical slogan than 'Fair and Balanced.' "

Keller, who will be stepping down in September to become a full-time columnist for The Times, is obviously still a key decider in how his newspaper is covering the scandal. Given his previous public remarks, he's very likely enjoying himself. As are the prime-time personalities on MSNBC and longtime Murdoch/Fox News Channel antagonist Keith Olbermann on his new network, Current TV. So in reality, none of their accounts are to be entirely trusted. That's sad to say, especially of The Times.

Still, Fox News Channel should be embarrassed at the way it's blown off what so far is the biggest media story of the century. Its little-watched daytime news programs have offered specks of coverage here and there. Although in one instance, longtime Fox and Friends toady Steve Doocy invited a PR guy named Bob Dilenschneider to join him in denouncing all the "piling on."

"You look at some sites, you would think that Martians had landed in New Jersey again," Doocy said. "We've got some serious problems in this country right now." Yeah. One of them is giving national exposure to clowns like him.

At the prime-time level, little if anything is expected of the brown-nosing Hannity, whose fawning interviews with prominent Republicans are his principal forte. Exhibit A: Hannity's wide-eyed genuflection in the presence of George W. Bush when he was busy pumping his book. Bush let Hannity interview him on his Crawford Ranch, and even took him for a free ride on the property. An awed Hannity ate it up, and there's no telling what else he might have eaten if asked. Were he presented with an opportunity to interview Murdoch, his first question would be something on the order of, "Sir, why do these liberals hate you so much?" And for Hannity, that would be hard-hitting.

O'Reilly, though, is supposed to have balls. I've long preferred him to the even more vainglorious Olbermann. On The O'Reilly Factor, he at least regularly spars with people who disagree with him. Even if he's prone to chest-thumping and talking over them.

O'Reilly's been spayed, however, when it comes to talking about the Murdoch imbroglio. He's said a sum total of nothing about it. Imagine if this were The New York Times, NBC News, CNN, MSNBC or any other major media outlet involved in a phone-hacking scandal of this magnitude. O'Reilly's take would be something like this: "We always knew they were liberal, folks. Now we see that they're crooks as well." And he'd keep pounding away, night after night.

His low point came Thursday, in tandem with blustering Bernard Goldberg during their weekly discourse on media issues. What did they discuss? Allegations that the Obama administration sometimes prefers to bypass Fox News Channel as a conduit. Or as O'Reilly put it, "Now new documents have emerged that seem to prove the White House doesn't like FNC at all."

The "new documents" didn't amount to much of anything. That is, unless you're surprised that some members of the president's staff preferred to bypass Fox News Channel on occasion. Wouldn't you? Sometimes you just get tired of getting punched in the head, although President Obama has done several one-on-ones with none other than O'Reilly, including during February's Super Bowl XLV.

In reality, no major media outlet is less willing to cooperate in news stories about itself than Fox News Channel. It's been that way since Day One. Publicists for the network pick and choose their favorites. And even their favorites are subject to constant questions about how a story is going to be played, when it's going to appear, etc., etc. I speak from first-hand experience, and from conversations with various colleagues.

O'Reilly, with whom I've had generally good relations over the years, is very much a picker and chooser in dealing with the media. He stiffs interview requests from those he deems unfriendly to him. Which covers a wide spectrum these days. And his show has been known to relentlessly dog, and sometimes physically pursue, those who have been critical of him or decline to appear on The O'Reilly Factor. At his best he's certainly more capable of being genuinely "Fair and Balanced" than Hannity is. But at his worst -- which is too often -- he's a bully with a persecution complex.

Last Thursday, O'Reilly and Goldberg chose to twit the Obama administration on a relatively trivial matter rather than make even a nominal effort to address the elephant (dung) in the room.

"When you're in the big leagues, you act like it," Goldberg at one point said of the president. "You don't go to war with a cable news operation."

Particularly if it's your own. No one realistically expects a full-blown investigation of Murdoch from the people on the receiving ends of his paychecks. Others media outlets are perfectly willing and able to do that.

But it's hypocritical almost beyond belief for O'Reilly to entirely ignore the matter, even during his show's weekly segment with Goldberg on current media issues. Mr. "No Spin Zone" and the unctuous author of Bias opted for a cowardly way out. For all of his braggadocio, O'Reilly suddenly is no cock of the walk on an issue that might actually prove his manhood.

"No show tackles tough issues like The Factor," the show's website crows. That's B.S. -- coming from a parakeet.

Read more from Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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'We laid waste to everything in our path, J.R. And for what?'

July 12, 2011 8:14 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Larry Hagman took more nasty spills as J.R. Ewing Monday night, informing viewers that younger brother Bobby "was always a fool" before vowing to take another turn as Texas' oiliest oil baron.

"I'm the one who belongs on Southfork. It's mine. And only mine," he said at the close of TNT's one-minute promos for its new Dallas series, scheduled to premiere next summer.

The 10-episode first season will be shot in North Texas, with production tentatively set to begin in mid-October.

The spots, which included the still resonant Dallas theme song, aired during the season premieres of TNT's most popular dramas, The Closer and Rizzoli & Isles. At first glances, Patrick Duffy (Bobby) looked to be the most vigorous of the three returnees from CBS' original Dallas (1978-91).

Hagman and Linda Gray (J.R.'s ex, Sue Ellen) also are being mixed and matched with a new set of spiteful, willful, much younger Ewing offshoots.

Take a look. And if you want more, go to TNT's Dallas page.

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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News 'Exclusives': How Much Did They Pay?

July 8, 2011 9:53 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Wonder how much they paid for this one?

It's become a back-of-the-mind question whenever ABC News in particular touts an "exclusive" interview. The network did it again Wednesday night with a Primetime Nightline edition built around co-anchor Terry Moran's one-on-one sitdown with Casey Anthony trial juror Jennifer Ford.

ABC News isn't alone in this practice. But thanks to 20/20 co-anchor Chris Cuomo, it is on the record as saying that such arrangements have become a very common practice in the business of "big get" journalism.

Cuomo is the son of former New York governor Mario Cuomo and brother of the state's current governor, Andrew Cuomo. Last month on CNN's Reliable Sources, Chris said he had no problem with ABC paying $15,000 for exclusive "lewd" photos provided by Meagan Broussard. She first had received them from Democratic U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner (N.Y.), the serial tweeter who specialized in showing off his body to various women of interest.

"The commercial exigencies of the business reach into every aspect of reporting now," Cuomo told Reliable Sources host Howard Kurtz. "It is my decision. I'm the anchor of 20/20. I could have said, 'Don't do it.' I don't because it is the state of play right now. I wish it were not. I wish money was not in the game. But you know, it's going to go somewhere else. You know someone else is going to pay for the same things."

In return for a reported $15,000 payment, Broussard subsequently did an exclusive interview with ABC. Networks had lied for years about "not paying for interviews." The dirty little secret -- although it didn't take a Sherlock Holmes to puzzle this out -- is that they technically paid for other considerations, with the recipient fully understanding that an interview also was expected as part of the package.

Jurors in the Casey Anthony trial, which ended in her acquittal on three counts of murdering her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee, initially declined to talk to the media. So why did Ford come forward only on ABC News rather than answering questions at a news conference? Was there something in it for her, other than getting numerous close-up shots on national television? Did any or all of her fellow 11 jurors get a cut as part of this arrangement? Maybe not, maybe so. But such questions now have become part of the conversation.

ABC News also is touting World News anchor Diane Sawyer's "exclusive" interview with Jaycee Dugard on a two-hour special edition of Primetime scheduled to air this Sunday (9-11 p.m. ET). Now 31, Dugard was held captive for 18 years by Phillip and Nancy Garrido. This will be her first interview.

According to a story in The New York Times, ABC News denies paying Dugard for the interview. But that same story, published June 12, cites an unnamed "former longtime ABC News executive" who says the network earlier paid a six-figure amount for home movies of Dugard.

During Wednesday's Primetime Nightline, anchor Moran noted in passing that a licensing fee had been paid for home movies of Caylee provided by Casey Anthony's parents. Reportedly, $200,000 was paid for footage that previously had aired across ABC News "platforms" and was recycled on Primetime Nightline. The Times says that the fee paid by ABC eventually "found its way" into Casey Anthony's defense fund.

For shame.

NBC News seems to have been an able and willing participant in these escalating "checkbook journalism" wars. It just hasn't been as forthright about it as Cuomo, who likely was called in by his bosses and verbally slapped around after his candid comments on Reliable Sources.

The Peacock lately touted its "exclusive" live interview with "Octomom" Nadya Suleman on Friday's Today. She brought her octuplets, plus her two oldest children, for what NBC called the "first-ever live in-studio" sitdown featuring the kids, with Today co-host Ann Curry as the conduit.

Suleman lately has been claiming she's broke. So is NBC helping her out a bit? Curry had a previous round of Octomom "exclusives" in February 2009, with the network insisting that "NBC News does not and will not pay for interviews." As earlier noted, that's a frequently used subterfuge, with "other considerations" instead coming into play when it comes to landing big fish.

In return for paydays, do the subjects of such exclusives ramp up their stories? Can they be trusted to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth when a network demands the "juice" in return for payment in full? Several years from now, will anyone involved in a big national -- or local -- story be willing to go on-camera without some sort of payday in return?

Ironically, money is being funneled to news sources at the same time that layoffs are an ever-present threat to TV news staffs. And if indeed it's the "state of play," then there's no end in sight. After all, we're a society built on truth and justice -- and greed.

So the standard answer to "Will you do an interview with us?" is more than ever going to be "What's in it for me?" And we're all going to be poorer for it.

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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'Happily Divorced': TV Land Stuck in Clunky Retro Gear

June 16, 2011 9:58 AM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Fran Drescher of The Nanny fame still talks as though she's just gargled with glass shards.

Which might be an overall healthier choice for you than watching her new comedy series, Happily Divorced. It's TV Land's latest effort to mix and match familiar stars of bygone TV hits. And perhaps it's time to stop for a while after striking gold with Hot In Cleveland before sinking to Retired at 35 and now this. That sprightly old-time sitcom-y feeling has quickly lost its retro-bounce. What's old isn't new again. It's just pretty dreadful.

Happily Divorced, premiering Wednesday at 10:30 p.m. ET after a new episode of Hot In Cleveland, is Drescher's first weekly series since the now defunct WB network's short-lived Living With Fran, which was axed in 2006. She's Fran again this time out in a comedy ripped from the headlines of her real-life discovery that husband Peter Marc Jacobson was gay.

They split up in 1999 after 21 years of marriage, but remain friends and collaborators on Happily Divorced, which co-stars John Michael Higgins (Kath & Kim) as Peter.

"What's the mattuh, Petuh?" Fran asks for openers after he can't seem to sleep.

"It's just that I think I'm gay," he says.

"What?"

"I'm gay."

"What? . . . But we just had sex after Leno. How gay can ya be?"

That's never quite explained during these very labored early minutes. But it turns out that Fran's parents, Dori and Glenn (Robert "Lou Grant" Walden, Rita "West Side Story" Moreno), knew all along that Peter preferred the company of men. So Dori counsels, "Sweetheart, don't throw away a good marriage over nothing."

Peter, a realtor, can't afford to move out just yet. "You're gay! Go to the YMCA!" Fran protests as the laugh track goes into hyper-howl. Six months later, they're divorced but still living together while Fran laments to her best pal, Judi (Tichina Arnold), "I haven't had sex since Peter dropped the bomb."

Just about everything drops like a rock in this bomb, with the gay jokes and stereotypes piling up in tandem with Fran cooing over a lug named Elliott (D.W. Moffett, segueing from his ruthless quarterback's-dad role in Friday Night Lights). Alas, he's destined to have a severe allergic reaction on a dinner date to a truffle that Fran thought was a black olive. Wah, wah, wah. You can't make this stuff up. But unfortunately they have.

One line is possibly grin-inducing. "I love her voice," a recovered Elliott tells Peter.

"Give it time," he rejoins, again to the complete merriment of a laugh track that otherwise badly needs a long vacation in Cancun.

It's hard to imagine the "give it time" line applying to Happily Divorced, which is more ham-handed than an Erick Dampier jump shot. Drescher still looks good a dozen years removed from the last season of The Nanny. But the lines coming from her mouth are too obvious for words.

TV Land might want to brainstorm its way into the 21st century at some point rather than reverting to recycled stars wedded to tired old formulas. It was kind of cute for a short while. Now it's time to grow up.

GRADE: D

Read more Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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'Too Big to Fail' Is All Business

May 21, 2011 9:36 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Leave it to HBO to not only tackle this daunting, sex-less numbers game, but to somehow make it dramatically interesting.

Not spectacularly entertaining, mind you. But a bravura lead performance by William Hurt and some early heavy lifting by James Woods give Too Big to Fail (Monday, May 23 at 9 p.m. ET on HBO) enough currency to carry it through this complex tale of 2008's near-collapse of the U.S. economy. Expensive-looking suits get a full workout, too, during the last late summer months of George W. Bush's presidency. Everyone feels the heat.

Hurt plays U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry "Hank" Paulson, former chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs. Woods is profane, mercurial Dick Fuld, whose Lehman Brothers investment bank was the only one to miss out on a government bailout. Instead it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in September 2008 while other titans of Wall Street either steeled themselves or scrambled to make deals. The film is adapted from the same-named book by New York Times financial reporter/columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin, who is no relation to Oscar- and Emmy-winning screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network, The West Wing).

Woods is ever-ready to chew scenery, but at best is guilty of only munching this time around. The film needs an attention-getting bulldog like him in its early going, and Woods is up to the task. His Fuld is a stone-stubborn f-bomb dropper who just can't fathom what's happened to his beloved company.

Hurt's Paulson soon comes to the fore, though, plugging away in the midst of the biggest financial calamity since the Great Depression. His portrayal is compelling to the core under the direction of accomplished Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential). Paulson at first methodically directs his troops before his temper shortens, his desperation grows and his physical appearance deteriorates.

"There's a deal to be made here. I'm going to make the deal," he initially says of saving Lehman Brothers from going under.

But Paulson's persuasive powers fail him in this case. "I don't know what's going to happen," he finally tells his steadfastly loyal wife, Wendy (a chip-in role for the always good Kathy Baker, also seen Sunday in CBS's seventh Jesse Stone movie).

A number of other familiar faces drop in and out, including Cynthia Nixon, Ed Asner, Paul Giamatti, Topher Grace, Bill Pullman, Matthew Modine, Tony Shalhoub, Evan Handler and Dan Hedaya.

Nixon, the former Sex and the City star, is effective in the only woman's part of any real import. She plays assistant secretary of the Treasury Michele Davis, who's in on all of his big decisions. Asner has just two brief scenes as power-broking Warren Buffett, one of them in a fast food restaurant with his grandkids. The iconic actor is outfitted with a blondish toupee as Buffett. Frankly, it looks fairly ridiculous on him at this stage of his career.

Lesser known Billy Crudup, who played a young J. Edgar Hoover in Public Enemies, has a key role as Timothy Geithner, President Obama's current Treasury secretary. In Too Big to Fail, he's still the hard-driving president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Paulson leans on him heavily as a man of both action and vision, with Crudup breathing considerable life into his role as Batman's Robin.

Too Big to Fail does a solid job of outlining how America got to this near-meltdown of the economy, with a number of real-life TV journalists seen in recurring clips from those times after presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both talk up the virtues of bank deregulation.

"This project is not only good for the soul of the country. It's good for the pocketbook as well," the real-life Bush says of one such initiative.

But it wasn't, with "toxic" onetime real estate assets such as sub-prime mortgages bringing Lehman Brothers to its knees while other banks began to buckle. Paulson eventually steered a controversial bailout bill through Congress in which nine big banking firms agreed to accept $125 billion in government money via the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

"I hope they use the money the way we're asking them to. They will lend it out, won't they?" asks Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke (Giamatti).

"Of course they will," Paulson says, repeating that assurance to convince himself.

But they didn't. And Too Big to Fail effectively follows the money while humanizing most of the moneychangers.

GRADE: B+

Read more Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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ABC's 'Happy Endings' finds its footing

April 13, 2011 5:59 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

It begins pretty clumsily with a wedding stoppage scene straight out of The Graduate.

Friends also quickly comes to mind.

Still, this is an otherwise new ABC comedy called Happy Endings. And after viewing three available episodes, let's dust off another old saw: All's well that ends well.

Premiering post-Modern Family with back-to-back episodes Wednesday (9:30 and 10 p.m. ET), Happy Endings quickly gets its game in gear. Save for Modern Family and The Middle, it emerges as ABC's best new sitcom since Better Off Ted unfortunately failed to find an audience. No need to repeat that history.

Elisha Cuthbert likely is the best-known cast member after playing Jack Bauer's oft-imperiled daughter, Kim, on 24. This time she's Alex. But the scene-stealer is Casey Wilson [photo at right], who never quite broke through on Saturday Night Live but fully registers on Happy Endings as loud, madcap Penny.

The first of Wednesday's two episodes, plus the scheduled April 20 and 27 half-hours, were submitted for review on ABC's media website. All have something going for them, particularly the last one in line, subtitled "Mein Coming Out." This is the one where Penny's accidental blind date turns out to be a Mr. Right whose only drawback is his surname -- Hitler. Meanwhile, gay Max (Adam Pally) is still using his gal pals as beards rather than come out to his occasionally visiting parents.

Rounding out the cast are Jane and Brad (Eliza Coupe, Damon Wayans Jr.) -- whose interracial marriage is peripheral so far -- and decimated Dave (Zachary Knighton), the guy who gets left at the altar when a rollerblading dude named Bo rolls into church to proclaim, "Alex, I love you!"

He's never seen again, but provides the impetus for Alex's cold feet and runaway bride remedy.

"Huge game-changer," Brad understates, concerned that the six will never be able to inhabit the same room again.

"Even I think roller blades are gay. And I had sex with a dude last night," Max needlessly riffs during these early moments of Happy Endings' awkward efforts to gain its footing. Which it eventually does, with creator-executive producer David Caspe at the helm of his first TV series.

The show's jilted Dave spends his next week in miserable, self-pitying shape while Jane (who's also Alex's sister) assures him this is all "just the sad chapter in your epic love story."

A raucous, cake-smashing 30th birthday dinner for Penny -- who remains adamant about being just 26 -- serves to lance various boils and put the six friends back into reasonable working order. And it's surprisingly good fun getting to this point, thanks to the oft-clever writing and a cast that clicks.

The April 20 edition even includes a nice little dig at Cuthbert's much-parodied altercation with a cougar (of the furry kind) on a super far-fetched Season 2 episode of 24. The three episodes also include references -- unflattering and otherwise -- to John Mayer, Kathy Bates, Paul Rudd, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dr. Sanjay Gupta and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

But the best-in-show pop culture riff comes during Jane's recitation of her close encounters with five couples' therapists after the Alex-Dave breakup.

"The third one looked like a female Scott Bakula," she tells husband Brad. "Which just stressed me out because I am way behind on my Men of a Certain Ages. And you know how mama likes a clean DVR."

Happy Endings will move to Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET next week, oddly slotted on a newly expanded, wall-to-wall ABC comedy lineup between new episodes of the returning Cougar Town and Modern Family repeats.

It's going to be tough to get noticed under such circumstances. But Happy Endings will need to attract a decent-sized audience -- and quickly -- before ABC makes its mid-May announcement of a new fall 2011 lineup. Getting left at the altar a second time would not be Happy Endings' idea of a happy ending.

GRADE: B+

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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NBC: Hurts So Bad

March 11, 2011 7:36 PM

By Ed Bark

Has a big-time broadcast network ever been in sorrier prime-time shape than NBC?

The network's new owner, Comcast, and its new entertainment president, Showtime export Robert Greenblatt, have miles to go before they can even feel safely ahead of Univision.

And given the ongoing population shifts, that day might well never come.

Yep, NBC is in a really bad way, with Sunday Night Football its only winning proposition. Three problems with that:

1. The Peacock must fill half of each TV season with something else.

2. No broadcast network makes money on the NFL because of the huge rights fees commanded by the league.

3. Unless owners and players somehow settle their huge differences, there may not be much of a season -- or any season -- in 2011.

In the latest ratings week (Feb. 28 to March 6), Nielsen Media Research says NBC averaged just 5.5 million viewers in prime-time and a piddling 5 percent share of all TV sets in use. American Idol-fueled Fox had more than twice as many viewers (11.6 million) and double the audience share.

The Peacock also ran fourth among advertiser-coveted 18-to-49-year-olds, drawing 2.1 million vs. Spanish language Univision's 1.9 million. That's not muy bueno for a network that now also runs a distant fourth on Thursday nights, where it dominated all comers for close to two decades with powerhouses such as The Cosby Show, Family Ties, Cheers, Seinfeld, Friends, Frasier, Will & Grace, L.A. Law and ER.

NBC's latter day Thursday night comedies by and large are still pretty good, with Emmy-winners 30 Rock and The Office still in play. But 30 Rock [photo at right] has never been a ratings winner. And The Office is both sagging in the Nielsens and facing a very shaky future next season without linchpin Steve Carell.

NBC's post-NFL Sunday night lineup, unveiled last Sunday, is Dateline, America's Next Great Restaurant and two hours of Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice. They respectively ran 54th, 70th and 34th in the weekly Nielsens, with only Celebrity Apprentice showing a bit of a pulse among 18-to-49-year-olds by placing 21st that week.

NBC's top performer in the total-viewer Nielsens is the midseason Monday night replacement series Harry's Law, starring veteran actress Kathy Bates [photo below] as a sour-tempered storefront lawyer. But it ranked only 25th, while sliding among 18-to-49-year-olds to 47th place.

It got no better for NBC on Monday of this week, when the two-hour return of The Event (after a 13-week absence) drew just 5.2 million viewers, performing below even the previous week's piddling prime-time average of 5.5 million viewers. The Event likewise was a non-event among 18-to-49-year-olds, running fourth in its time slot.

Another heavily promoted NBC entry, The Cape, collapsed into 78th place among total viewers last week, running behind all five installments of the Univision telenovela Triunfo Del Amor. Cape likewise came a cropper with 18-to-49-year-olds, landing in 90th place. Bet your life savings that neither The Cape nor The Event will be back next season.

There's this, too. NBC filled all three hours of last Thursday's prime-time schedule with repeats of The Office. The most-watched episode had 3.1 million viewers and the least-watched, 2.7 million. In that same week, two Monday night episodes of History Channel's Pawn Stars had 3.9 million and 3.5 million viewers. Cable's top draw, MTV's Jersey Shore, had more total viewers (7.8 million) than every NBC series except Harry's Law and Celebrity Apprentice.

NBC might be able to take some comfort in the fact that ABC isn't exactly lighting up the prime-time skies either. But despite its prime-time troubles, third-place ABC still averaged 1.1 million more total viewers than the Peacock did last week, while also drawing 450,000 more viewers in the 18-to-49 age range. Plus, ABC has the cavalry on the way in the form of Dancing with the Stars, which returns March 21. NBC has absolutely nothing of any import in reserve, unless you count more plug-in additions of Minute to Win It as very special events.

All of this and more give Comcast and Greenblatt possibly the steepest hill to climb in prime time history. NBC has no thoroughbreds on the air at the moment. It can't bank on a single series to consistently win its time slot. And its year-to-year averages in both total viewers and 18-to-49-year-olds also are in far deeper declines than any rival broadcast network's.

Other than football, the Peacock's lone legitimate hit comes again this summer, when America's Got Talent returns to the living. NBC otherwise has got plenty of nothin' -- and three more months of it at that.

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Animated 'Archer' Gets Away With Just About Everything

January 26, 2011 9:43 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

The cartoon teen in Archer's Season 2 opener Thursday night can do what none of MTV's can -- get naked and be sexually explicit without raising concerns that these might be violations of federal pornography statutes.

Perhaps you've heard about the semi-uproar over Skins, MTV's explicit adaptation of a hit British series about an oft-time teenage wasteland. Some of the actors in the cast are under the age of 18, which has put the network on the defensive after the Parents Television Council attacked Skins as a "dangerous" dramatization that includes possibly illegal sexual content involving minors. Since the show's Jan. 17 premiere, several major sponsors have dropped out, including Taco Bell and Subway. Audiences also dropped, from 3.3 million for the opening episode to 1.6 million for last Monday's second hour.

Both Skins and FX's Archer are rated TV MA, the strongest viewer advisory available. But Archer, which returns for a new 13-episode run on Thursday (10 p.m. ET), is strictly a sendup of the well-worn spy genre. And in that guise, it's both jaw-droppingly funny and brilliantly voice-acted by a cast that includes Jessica Walter, Aisha Tyler, Chris Parnell and H. Jon Benjamin in the lead role of vain and awkwardly adept master spy Sterling Archer.

Now back to the teen scheme of things, during a provocative season premiere subtitled "Swiss Miss." Archer's demanding, tough-love mother, Malory (Walter), who runs the ISIS agency, takes her operatives to a snow-covered European resort for the purpose of protecting a Swiss billionaire's 16-year-old daughter, Anka, from a kidnapping threat.

Fellow agent Lana Kane (Tyler) isn't quite over Archer. So she gets a little miffed at him for eyeing Anka a little too closely after she clandestinely squeezes his tush.

"I saw you totally eye-bang a teenager," Lana carps before stalking off.

Anka turns out to be a sex-craving Lolita who doesn't at all mind Archer dubbing her "Countess Von Fingerbang." She's further aroused by the sight of his chiseled bod in a bath towel. Which is inadvertently dropped when Anka jumps into his arms after he saves her from a would-be abductor.

In her native state of Germany, the age of consent is 14, Anka has informed him. An incredulous Archer wonders whether her homeland is "the Alabama of Europe."

"In many ways, yes," she purrs. "But we can talk about that in bed."

Anka's father then barges in to see his daughter straddling her flustered, naked and still upright protector. And perhaps at this point it should be noted that the actress voicing Anka is 33-year-old Kari Wahlgren, a veteran of numerous animated outings on big screen and small. FX and Archer might be in big trouble if it instead were one of the underage actors from Modern Family. That indeed would be going too far.

The episode ends with a prolonged and splendidly animated snowmobile chase in which Anka is topless throughout after initially asking Archer, "Do you think I need a boob job?" He keeps a hands-off attitude until the bitterly cold end, when Anka begs Archer to put his "big mitten-y gloves" on her freezing chest. "Only because this is a medical emergency," he says, finally relenting before Lana drives up to again draw the wrong conclusion.

Adult animation hasn't yet reached the point -- at least on an advertiser-supported cable network -- where female endowments or male tools can be shown with abandon. But side views of ample breasts (including Anka's) and fully bared bottoms again are part of Archer's landscape, as they were in Season 1. The S-word also is used with regularity, as when plus-sized ISIS Human Resources director Pam Poovey (Amber Nash) exclaims "Holy shitcakes!" in next week's outing.

Archer in short can get away with just about everything Skins can't. And it does so in ways that are often laugh-out-loud funny. In every way imaginable, Archer is about as far removed from The Flintstones as Guy Fieri is from a vegetarian diet.

Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" block or Comedy Central would kill for a show like this. Instead, it's FX scoring again with another out-of-the-box, in-your-face series that most assuredly isn't for everyone -- but most definitely knows what it's doing.

GRADE: B+

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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Olbermann Out and About Again

January 23, 2011 9:43 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Although he's made himself toxic wherever he's worked, CNN probably would be wise to make itself the next waystop in Keith Olbermann's checkered career.

The slot currently occupied by the network's failed and flailing Parker Spitzer would be perfect for the oft-bombastic Olbermann, who could resume competing against The O'Reilly Factor and now Lawrence O'Donnell in MSNBC's 8 p.m. ET hour.

Olbermann's sudden and rather shocking last day at MSNBC was Friday, when he said goodbye on his Countdown program by reading a James Thurber story with the motto, "It is better to ask some of the questions than to know all of the answers."

At roughly the same time, MSNBC issued its own by-the-book statement via email: "MSNBC and Keith Olbermann have ended their contract . . . MSNBC thanks Keith for his integral role in MSNBC's success and we wish him well in his future endeavors."

The network also said that The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell will slide from from 10 to 8 p.m. ET, effective Monday, while The Ed Show (with Ed Schultz) will move from 6 p.m. ET to O'Donnell's former slot.

Olbermann, who returned to MSNBC in 2003 after a previous short stint in 1997-98, had been in the middle of a four-year, $30 million contract. But he publicly crossed swords with the network last November, receiving a hand-slap two-day suspension after acknowledging his monetary donations to three Democratic campaigns. Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough likewise received a two-day suspension for contributing to Republican campaigns.

(Olbermann and Scarborough have been at odds personally as well as politically, with Olbermann carping, "Jesus, Joe, why don't you get a shovel?" after Scarborough talked up Republican presidential candidate John McCain's chances during MSNBC's 2008 Democratic National Convention coverage.)

During his on-air statement Friday, Olbermann told viewers that "there were many occasions, particularly during the last two-and-a-half years, when all that surrounded the show, but never the show itself, was just too much for me. But your support and loyalty, and if I may use the word 'insistence,' ultimately required that I keep going."

At a salary of more than $7 million per year, it wasn't as though Olbermann were carrying a cross. But no network news personality -- not even Olbermann's archrival Bill O'Reilly -- had a more self-aggrandizing air about him.

MSNBC contends that Olbermann's abrupt dismissal had nothing to do with Comcast's takeover of NBC Universal last week. That's a fairly believable disclaimer. Olbermann, who turns 52 on Thursday, has gained a reputation as being notoriously "difficult" during a broadcast career that has taken him from ESPN to MSNBC to Fox Sports Net and then back to MSNBC. "I fired him. He's crazy," former employer Rupert Murdoch was quoted as saying after Fox Sports Net and Olbermann parted ways.

Still, there's no denying Olbermann's talents as both a wordsmith and on-air communicator. On Countdown he fired from the left at will while invariably inviting only those guests who agreed with him. His frequent "Special Comment" interludes at the end of Countdown gave full vent to his rages against all things Republican. Olbermann's nightly "Worst Person In the World" segments likewise became a staple, with seldom a week going by in which either O'Reilly or Rush Limbaugh didn't make his list.

The audience response to Countdown, even though it never managed to outdraw O'Reilly, helped push MSNBC past CNN in the prime-time ratings race. It also prompted MSNBC to hire more voices from the left in a strategy to beat Fox News Channel at its own partisan game. Schultz, O'Donnell and Rachel Maddow all were hired after Olbermann set the stage. They share his left-of-center political views.

CNN has fought to preserve the middle ground with its prime-time lineup and overall presentation. But although still profitable, the granddaddy of cable news networks remains in the midst of a makeover.

The Crossfire-ish Parker Spitzer, co-anchored by conservative commentator Kathleen Parker and former New York governor Eliot Spitzer (who resigned after a prostitution scandal), has been a critically panned ratings disaster since its October premiere. It's still too early to tell with Piers Morgan Tonight, which last Monday replaced CNN's quarter-century old Larry King Live.

Olbermann's partisanship and overall degree of difficulty would be problematic for CNN. But there's little doubt that he'd at least double the audience for Parker Spitzer, which on Thursday night had 522,000 viewers to Countdown's 1.1 million, while The O'Reilly Factor in turn almost tripled Olbermann with 2.9 million.

Hiring Olbermann -- who clearly isn't welcome at Fox News Channel -- would give CNN both a ratings boost and a lot of baggage. It also would resume the O'Reilly/Olbermann not-so-civil war, during which the latter once compared his foe to discredited "Red-baiting" 1950s Sen. Joe McCarthy in remarks to TV critics.

"Joe McCarthy has people to this day who say of him, 'He was right. He really was a great American,' " Olbermann said. "I'm grateful that Bill O'Reilly is on television. I mean, what if he were in Congress? There's always been a little room for some crazy demagogues."

Many would say that description likewise fits Olbermann, who's now in search of more rope with which to both hang and martyr himself. But CNN might as well go after him. It badly needs a prime-time jolt, and Olbermann's just the guy for that job.

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com.

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Ed Bark Counts Down Top TV Developments of 2010

December 27, 2010 3:57 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

The TV world again turned on its head in 2010. Let's get right to our annual countdown of what had viewers buzzing.

10. Hotsy totsy -- Eighty-eight-year-old Betty White became the year's Golden Girl at an age when most formerly able-bodied Americans are gumming creamed corn. A determined Facebook campaign led to her becoming the oldest-ever host of Saturday Night Live, for which she won an Emmy. White also returned to prime time in the TV Land sitcom Hot In Cleveland while guest-starring all over the place. Throw in a heavily replayed Snickers Super Bowl commercial for good measure.

9. Here a Palin, there a Palin -- Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin warmed up for a likely presidential run with a TLC reality series, Sarah Palin's Alaska, that found her allegedly roughing it alongside expert guides and a camera crew. Meanwhile, her daughter Bristol unaccountably hoofed and puffed her way to the finals of ABC's Dancing with the Star while Mama Grizzly beamed from the studio audience.

8. Bush book tour hooks networks -- Former president George W. Bush returned to the public eye in a big way with his nationally televised book tour on behalf of Decision Points. He began with NBC's Matt Lauer before getting comfy with Oprah Winfrey and downright chummy with Fox News Channel's sycophantic Sean Hannity. CBS, ABC and CNN also bit, with Bush snubbing only MSNBC. Which was to be expected.

7. Ends of days for a pair of Jacks -- Two of prime-time's all-time string-alongs ended their long and winding roads in May. On Fox's 24, Kiefer Sutherland's physically and emotionally battered Jack Bauer was last seen heading overseas (from where a big-screen movie is supposed to originate). And on ABC's Lost, Matthew Fox's physically and emotionally battered Dr. Jack Shephard expired on the island before ascending to a heavenly reunion with his former plane-mates. The Lost finale was shredded by some acolytes for failing to tie up a wide variety of loose ends; 24 simply ran out of even remotely plausible new ways for Jack to save the world.

6. He's sorry, so sorry -- Tiger Woods at last came out of seclusion in February via a closely controlled nationally televised mea culpa attended by his mother and assorted friends. "I brought this shame on myself. It's up to me to start having a life of integrity," he said as part of a lengthy prepared statement. Then it was on to The Masters tournament, with TV covering and analyzing virtually every swing and expression.

5. LeBron-athon -- "I'm going to take my talents to South Beach," LeBron James told interviewer Jim Gray after making a spectacle of himself on an elongated ESPN special that was ripped by just about everybody. James' decision to leave the Cleveland Cavaliers was deemed understandable by many. But the manner in which he announced it took his image straight into the toilet. Or so the pontificators said.

4. Juan is the loneliest number -- NPR's knee-jerk dismissal of Juan Williams for comments he made on Fox News Channel's The O'Reilly Factor ignited a firestorm of criticism from virtually everywhere except MSNBC. In short order, two of its hosts, Keith Olbermann and Joe Scarborough, received hand-slap two-day suspensions for making contributions to political candidates. FNC immediately signed Williams to a new contract after his comments about feeling uneasy when on a plane with passengers in "Muslim garb." FNC personalities predictably called for an immediate end to all taxpayer funding of NPR. But by the end of the year, that argument had seemingly lost its punch.

3. King abdicates throne on sinking CNN -- Larry King ended a quarter-century run on CNN with his Dec. 16 sign-off on Larry King Live. The once dominant all-news network, which also recently dismissed president Jon Klein, has fallen behind both Fox News Channel and MSNBC in the prime time Nielsen numbers. Its new Parker Spitzer hour, which premiered in the fall, has been widely panned and little-watched as the network almost desperately seeks to re-invent itself. King's replacement, Britisher Piers Morgan, is due in January. He'll also keep his other job, as the alpha judge on NBC's hit summer series America's Got Talent.

2. Idol adds and subtracts while ratings retract -- The most powerful series in TV history, Fox's American Idol, had a bruising year that began with judge Simon Cowell's January announcement he'd be leaving the show after May's season finale. With its ratings and relevance slipping, Fox responded by rehiring former executive producer Nigel Lythgoe while sacking judges Ellen DeGeneres and Kara DioGuardi. Their replacements, Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler, eventually signed on after protracted on-and-off contract negotiations. Host Ryan Seacrest and charter judge Randy Jackson are the only constants as Idol nears the Jan. 19 start of a very pivotal Season 10.

1. Late night tilt-a-whirl -- The year began with Conan O'Brien leaving NBC's Tonight Show behind, rather than succumb to the network's plan to have a half-hour Jay Leno comedy show precede him after late-night local newscasts had. Leno's prime-time debacle and O'Brien's slipping Tonight ratings had prompted another hamhanded attempt to somehow restore order. No one expected O'Brien to wind up at TBS, with Fox seen as his most likely new home. But Conan surprisingly became a TBS reality in November, while the network's incumbent Lopez Tonight went quietly to a later hour. Leno's Tonight re-do lately is falling flat after an initially strong start, while CBS' Late Show With David Letterman has drawn even. But both are being beaten by ABC's Nightline. So who's laughing now?

Check out more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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No '$#*!' for CBS, just a 'Criminal Minds' spinoff and 3 other new shows

December 26, 2010 4:44 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

No. 1-rated CBS is doing less deck-shuffling than its rivals, but will still make some significant changes in the coming year.

The network announced that four new series will be joining its new mix, although Paula Abdul's previously announced Live to Dance basically is a place-holder for Survivor as Wednesday night's lead-off hitter.

The notable eviction is William Shatner's $#*! My Dad Says, which had been nestled behind The Big Bang Theory on Thursdays. The $#*! will last hit the fan on Feb. 17. On the following Thursday, its 8:30 ET replacement is Rules of Engagement, which has been airing on Mondays between How I Met Your Mother and Two and a Half Men.

CBS says that Dad Says "will have completed its on-air order for the season" when it leaves the network. That leaves the door open a crack for renewal next season. But in truth, CBS has never been entirely comfortable with either the title of the show or its fall-off among advertiser-coveted 18-to-49-year-olds. Big Bang currently ranks seventh in that key demographic with an average of 9.8 million 18-to-49-year-olds per episode Thursday at 8 p.m. ET, with Dad Says falling at 8:30 ET to 31st with 7.6 million viewers.

Starting Feb. 21, Rules of Engagement will be replaced at 8:30 ET Monday by the new comedy Mad Love. Jason Biggs of American Pie fame heads the cast in this saga about a "quartet of New Yorkers, two of whom are falling in love while the other two despise each other."

CBS also is adding Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior at 10 p.m. ET Wednesday on Feb. 16. Forest Whitaker and Janeane Garofolo head the network's latest crime-solving team.

Moving from Wednesday to Friday is The Defenders, starting Feb. 4. In the interim, Tom Selleck's Blue Bloods cop drama gets a four-week run in The Defenders' 10 p.m. ET Wednesday slot (Jan. 19-Feb. 9). It will then move back to its previous home -- Fridays at 10 p.m. ET. Out of luck on Friday is Medium, which ends its run Jan. 21, to be supplanted by Defenders in the 8 p.m. ET leadoff spot.

Abdul's Live to Dance launches on Tuesday, Jan. 4 with a two-hour edition before moving to its regular Wednesday 8 p.m. ET spot the following night. On Jan. 19, it will be pitted directly against the Season 10 premiere of Fox's American Idol. Dance so far is scheduled for just a six-week run, with Survivor: Redemption Island starting up on Wednesday, Feb. 16 at 8 p.m. ET.

The fourth new series, Chaos, is set for a Friday, April 1 premiere in that night's lead-off slot. Freddy Rodriguez (Six Feet Under) and Eric Close (Without A Trace) star in what CBS describes as a "comedic drama about a group of rogue CIA spies in the Office of Disruptive Services who combat threats to national security amidst bureaucratic gridlock, rampant incompetence and political infighting."

Sounds just like Congress, but CBS isn't about to break away from its tried-and-true crime and punishment format. All 12 of its scripted one-hour series are in that genre

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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Christmas Sing With Bing on DVD

December 10, 2010 1:13 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Just five weeks before his Oct. 14, 1977 death, a crooning, cardigan-sweatered Ghost of TV Christmas Specials Past performed a well-worn carol with an androgynous, cutting-edge rock star 44 years his junior.

Bing Crosby and David Bowie doing The Little Drummer Boy still seems slightly more incongruous than Santa Claus performing O Holy Night with Twisted Sister. Or Perry Como combining forces with Ozzy Osbourne on Ave Maria.

But they somehow got through it, and the end result is a small but obviously essential part of the new Bing Crosby: Volume Two -- The Christmas Specials DVD. The two-disc set, which is somewhat misnamed, retails for $30 but can easily be found at discounted prices. (It's $18 here with a free bonus CD.)

All in all, is it worth giving or receiving it? Well, first of all, it's fairly important to have actually heard of Bing Crosby. So that might deal out about half the population. Otherwise I'd give this collection a marginal "yes," but not because of the Bing-Bowie interlude on an otherwise almost unbearable Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas (which originally aired 47 days after his death on Nov. 30, 1977).

The real treat here is the half-hour bonus feature Happy Holidays With Bing and Frank, first telecast on Dec. 20, 1957. This was Sinatra's show, but Bing was his only guest. And according to an accompanying mini-booklet, though their collaboration was aired in black-and-white, it was also filmed in color for a planned theatrical release. That never happened, but the rich color version was unearthed decades later and is part of this collection.

Frank starts it off by taking a stab at trimming a tinsel-choked Christmas tree, dropping an ornament in the process. He also sings Mistletoe and Holly before welcoming Bing to his made-for-TV bachelor pad for a "little toddy for the body" and exchange of gifts.

The banter is fairly minimal, though. Frank and Bing mostly sing, both with carolers and in duets and solos. Crosby became very proprietary with his show-closing holiday anthem White Christmas. So it's always him alone at first, with others then allowed to join in. Frank gets his cue via Bing's "Well, don't just stand there." They're terrific together before Frank serves up another drink. Then the two of them sit down for dinner, with a white-jacketed waiter wheeling in a golden brown turkey as the final credits roll. It's pure showbiz hokum, but both legends are still at the tops of their games during this convivial and very watchable feast of songs and trimmings.

Also included is a quartet of one-hour Crosby Christmas specials, which in those days had actual running times of over 50 minutes. (Subtract 10 minutes from that total in today's commercial-infested times.)

Crosby's first official holiday outing hit prime time on Dec. 11, 1961, in black-and-white from England. But only its original air date is Christmas-y. In fact there are no seasonal songs at all until Bing's climactic White Christmas. His guests otherwise are a collection of British personalities, plus a "surprise" appearance by Bob Hope as Der Bingle's "Aunt Matilda."

One of the Brits, Ron Moody, also shows up on Crosby's final Merrie Olde Christmas, a positively creaky hour plagued by too little music and way too much lame exposition and comedy.

Crosby was a gaunt 74 at that point, and for several years had included second wife Kathryn Grant and their kids, Harry, Nathaniel and Mary Frances (who went on to shoot J.R. Ewing on Dallas) on his annual Christmas special guest list. Twiggy chimes in, too, at one point playing Tiny Tim. And Bowie also has a self-standing and primitive-looking music video in which he sings his then newly recorded Heroes.

Bowie does not participate in the big end-of-the show Christmas medley. Perhaps he'd had quite enough at that point. Bing then walks off to sing White Christmas by his lonesome -- for what turned out to be the last time. So it's quite poignant in that respect. And you might want to fast-forward to get there. This would spare you the joke about the "creamed pheasant, country style" cooking on the stove.

"And you serve it stewed?" Kathryn asks the veddy English cook, played in drag by veteran British character actor Stanley Baxter.

"Oh, you got to," she/he replies. "It tastes dreadful if you're stone cold sober."

Only one of the included four specials, 1971's Bing Crosby and the Sounds of Christmas, has a full wall-to-wall holiday motif. Besides his wife and kids, Bing welcomes Robert Goulet, opera star Mary Costa (who's quite good) and The Mitchell Singing Boys choir.

Goulet is a classic over-singer, but pretty much keeps a lid on it here. The thoroughly leisurely pace allows a seeming eternity for a musical interpretation of O. Henry's The Cop and the Anthem story. Bing is down-and-out in a designer bum's outfit, longing to spend a night in jail on a bitter cold Christmas Eve. Goulet plays several parts, and the overall result is kinda sorta affecting.

Meanwhile, the Crosby kids play a little intendedly discordant holiday music on pots, pans and glasses while Dad grimaces and impersonates Jack Benny's famed chin-in-hand deadpan. Later, Harry plays acoustic guitar while Bing sings The Christmas Song. He gets an affectionate head pat at song's end before Bing pretends that Harry's hair is full of greasy kid's stuff.

The fourth special, The Bing Crosby Show for Clairol, originally aired on Christmas Eve 1962, with guests Mary Martin and Andre Previn. It's his first full-color outing but oddly omits Christmas music until the closing segment.

Martin, mother of Larry "J.R." Hagman, otherwise gets more than ample time to display her considerable talents. So if you've heard of her, and like her, this is quite a showcase. There's also a bizarre "Doin' the Bing" production number in which Crosby and a gaggle of dancers cavort while seated in light orange swivel chairs. Perhaps Bing was smokin' something other than tobacco in that trademark pipe of his.

One more thing. Crosby should be credited with being somewhat ahead of his time in terms of making Christmas an inclusive experience. The Christmas medley portion on the Clairol hour features an appearance by the United Nations Children's Choir, a multi-ethnic ensemble that helps illustrate a Crosby-Martin song about how the Christ child is perceived in many different colors worldwide.

White Christmas again serves as Crosby's inimitable closer. This collection has six different renditions of a song that knows but one color. And more than 33 years after its crooner's death, there is still no good reason to accept any substitutes.

Read much more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com

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'Men' Certainly Ages Well

December 4, 2010 11:15 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

TNT's best-ever drama series -- the show that defies all conventional wisdom about what should work on TV -- finds its way to Season 2 Monday night.

Amazingly, Men of a Certain Age (10 p.m. ET) has nothing to do with fatalities, legalities or life-saving medical procedures. Its three middle-aged central characters -- Joe Tranelli, Owen Thoreau Jr. and Terry Elliott -- are a party store owner, a car dealership manager and a fading actor turned car salesman. Not a lot of made-for-TV jeopardy there, in times when all 12 of CBS' drama series are either crime- or courtroom-related.

Created by Ray Romano and Mike Royce, Certain Age makes for a fine mess of male angst. But no one's in a fetal position just yet. The midlife struggles of Joe (Romano), Owen (Andre Braugher) and Terry (Scott Bakula) are relatable without ever being overbearing. A little whining is permissible but only in short bursts. These aren't pathetic sad sacks. But yeah, they do have issues.

Joe, a newly divorced father of two, has curbed his enthusiasm for sports gambling and hopes to join the senior pro golf tour. In real life, Romano is an avid swinger/putter, so he looks pretty good with a club. His Joe's Party Depot is of increasingly less interest to him.

Owen, married with two young sons, is striving to be an effective bossman at the dealership his domineering dad (Richard Gant as Owen Sr.) built from the ground up. His newest employee is Terry, who still finds it relatively easy to get laid. Meanwhile, his acting career has fallen down and can't get up.

The three of them otherwise go on weekly hikes and hang out not at a bar, but at Norm's diner. This allows for ample banter and grousing, with Joe newly embarrassed by the reading glasses he needs to decipher the menu.

Terry is chided about his "bang-zoom" sex life, but protests that "I don't bang-zoom." Joe's re-entry into the dating world and its attendant bedrooms is aided by a chance meeting in Monday's Season 2 opener. Owen and his wife, Melissa (Lisa Gay Hamilton), remain happily if sometimes fitfully married. She wants to re-enter the work force; he doesn't know if it's time yet.

The touch remains light, but never farcical, throughout the new season's first two episodes. Bakula's Terry initially resonates a bit more than his mates, particularly in a second episode that has him enduring dealership slings and arrows from a ridiculous old commercial that lately has gone YouTube viral.

TNT is owned by Turner Broadcasting System, Inc., which also runs TBS. And it's clear there's a product placement deal in place with Chevrolet. Twenty new Chevy Cruzes currently are part of a contest giveaway on TBS' Conan. And a Cruze also has a bit part in Monday's episode of Certain Age.

Romano, whom virtually everyone knows from Everybody Loves Raymond, has succeeded in fashioning quite a second act for himself. Not that his increasingly sturdy dramatic acting is any threat to the likes of Sean Penn or Johnny Depp.

Still, the ways in which Certain Age charms and disarms are a major accomplishment in the current prime-time scheme of things. Weekly tales of three life-challenged middle-aged men would be laughed out of the programming suites at CBS, ABC, NBC and Fox. What's the hook, how 'bout the crooks, whose life is threatened, who's being two-timed, where's the heat? In short, how the hell do we sell this thing?

Romano and TNT have found a way, drawing a robust-for-cable average of 4.2 million viewers per episode for Certain Age's first season. All of TNT's seven other first-run dramas are about cops, docs or freelance vigilantes. The lone exception remains exceptional.

GRADE: A-minus

Read more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com.

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Barbara Walters Embraces the Big O -- In Prime Time

December 2, 2010 8:03 AM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Barbara Walters and ABC's prime-time domain aren't quite done with one another.

She's given up her yearly pre-Oscar specials, but hasn't yet relinquished her clout when it comes to big-time hobnobbing. So here comes ABC's "One Night, One Big Event" -- namely back-to-back Dec. 9th Babs specials in which she first spends an hour with Oprah Winfrey and then presents her 18th 10 Most Fascinating People of the year extravaganza...

A Barbara Walters Special: Oprah, the Next Chapter will be the first of innumerable salutes to the daytime TV queen. ABC promises a revealing interview, an "exclusive preview" of Winfrey's new OWN cable network (which launches in January), and "the most memorable moments" from Winfrey's groundbreaking talk show, which is ending its 25-year run next year. In other words, Tom Cruise will be seen jumping up and down on her couch again.

Then comes those fassssssssss-inating people, with ABC and Walters as usual keeping No. 1 a secret. Otherwise making the cut are Betty White, Kate Middleton, LeBron James, Justin Bieber, Sarah Palin, Jennifer Lopez, Sandra Bullock and the cast of Jersey Shore.

OK, that's only eight, so maybe they're still firming things up. Or perhaps Snooki and "The Situation" count for two, even if their collective IQs may not amount to much more than an igloo's room temperature.

ABC notes that Palin is the first and only person to be fascinating for three consecutive years. Among other things, she tells Walters, "There's also rumors that Trig isn't my son. There's also rumors that Track went to Iraq to avoid jail. There is a lot of BS out there. I don't want to just believe that it comes with the territory, when you put yourself forward, in the name of public service, that you have to take that kind of garbage that's out there."

Please stop putting yourself out there, then.

Read much more from Ed Bark at unclebarky.com.

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'Idol' Moves to Wednesday-Thursday

November 19, 2010 9:50 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

American Idol's weekly results shows will get a Thursday night berth for the first time as part of a Fox midseason lineup that also includes five new series, all but one of them scripted.

Idol, which will deploy new judges Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler plus some format changes, has been airing on Tuesdays and Wednesdays for most of its first nine seasons. But Season 10 inaugurates a Wednesday-Thursday shift, with season premiere dates set for Jan. 19-20.

Idol will begin with one-hour Wednesday episodes before inflating to two hours on Feb. 16. Beginning April 6, the faltering Fox cash cow is scheduled to deflate back to 90 minutes, with a new "offbeat workplace comedy," Breaking In with Christian Slater, getting the 9:30 p.m. ET slot.

The Chicago Code, a new police drama from The Shield creator Shawn Ryan, will be paired with House on Monday nights. Also new are the big money game show Million Dollar Money Drop, the animated series Bob's Burgers and a relationship comedy, Mixed Signals.

Fringe will move to Fridays, a night that long has been a death valley for Fox. Kitchen Nightmares will be its running mate.

Canceled are Running Wilde and The Good Guys.

Here are the nights, times and dates for Fox's midseason machinations. (All times ET.)

MONDAY
8 p.m. -- Lie to Me, two-hour episode Jan. 10 before House moves back in on Jan. 17.
9 p.m. -- Lie to Me, starting Jan. 17 before The Chicago Code supplants it on Feb. 7.

TUESDAY
8 p.m. -- Glee encore episodes, beginning Jan. 4 before new episodes kick in on Feb. 8.
9 p.m. -- Million Dollar Money Drop, beginning Jan. 4, with Raising Hope and the new Mixed Signals taking over on Feb. 8.

WEDNESDAY
8 p.m. -- Human Target on Jan. 5 and 12 before one-hour episodes of American Idol start on Jan. 19. Two-hour Idol episodes launch on Feb. 16. Idol then shrinks to 90 minutes on April 6.
9 p.m. -- Human Target, starting on Jan. 26 and running until Idol steps in on Feb. 16.
9:30 p.m. -- Breaking In, starting April 6.

THURSDAY
8 p.m. -- Million Dollar Money Drop, beginning Jan. 6 until Idol arrives on Jan. 20.
9 p.m. -- Bones repeats, starting Jan. 6, before new episodes begin on Jan. 20.

FRIDAY
8 p.m. -- AT&T Cotton Bowl from Dallas on Jan. 7. Kitchen Nightmares has its season premiere on Jan. 21 (so far nothing to fill the void on Jan. 14).
8 p.m. -- Kitchen Nighmares repeat on Jan. 21, with new episodes of Fringe beginning on Jan. 28.

SATURDAY
NFC Division Playoffs on Jan. 15 before two doses of COPS and America's Most Wanted resume the following week.

SUNDAY
It's quite a jumble, so let's note that Bob's Burgers launches at 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 9. Super Bowl XLV from Cowboys Stadium is Feb. 6, followed by a new episode of Glee. Then on Feb. 13, here's the all-cartoon lineup:
7 p.m. - The Simpsons
7:30 p.m. - American Dad
8 p.m. - The Simpsons
8:30 p.m. - Bob's Burgers
9 p.m. - Family Guy
9:30 p.m. - The Cleveland Show

Much more by Ed Bark at unclebarky.com.

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NBC Adding 3 Scripted Series

November 19, 2010 3:04 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Downtrodden NBC will try anew in January with a heavily jumbled midseason lineup that turns Thursdays over entirely to comedy and premieres a new sci fi-ish cop series, The Cape.

The latter series will temporarily supplant The Event on Monday nights at 9 p.m. ET after a two-hour sneak preview on Sunday, Jan. 9.

NBC's three other newcomers are the legal drama Harry's Law (from Boston Legal/The Practice creator David E. Kelley), a sitcom titled Perfect Couples and the reality-competition series America's Next Great Restaurant.

Perfect Couples, which NBC bills as the "heroic journey" of three pairs of twosomes, is being slotted on Thursday nights between Community and The Office. It will mark the first three-hour, all-comedy network lineup since CBS' 1977 Saturday night schedule of The Bob Newhart Show, We've Got Each Other, The Jeffersons, The Tony Randall Show and The Carol Burnett Show.

NBC's Thursday 10 p.m. ET hour, currently occupied by The Apprentice and previously home base for the likes of ER, L.A. Law and Hill Street Blues, will be filled by 30 Rock (already renewed for next season) and Outsourced. The new schedule launches Jan. 20.

Returning in midseason are Parks and Recreation, The Marriage Ref, Who Do You Think You Are?, Celebrity Apprentice and Minute to Win It. As previously reported, the freshmen series Outlaw and Undercovers are goners. School Pride also is being junked.

Chase, starring Kelli Giddish as the head of a Texas-based team of U.S. marshals, will be supplanted on Mondays at 10 p.m. ET by the new Harry's Law, which co-stars two-time Oscar-winner Kathy Bates.

In its new Wednesday slot (beginning Jan. 12), Chase will air at 9 p.m. ET between Minute to Win It and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

The Cape stars David Lyons (ER) as an honest cop on a corrupt force who's framed for a series of murders and then presumed dead. Instead he re-emerges in disguise as his son's favorite comic book hero. Summer Glau, from Fox's Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, co-stars as an "investigative blogger" named Orwell.

Here's NBC's night-by-night midseason schedule -- which can be kind of dizzying.

(All times are ET.)

MONDAY
8 p.m. -- Chuck
9 p.m. -- The Cape, beginning on Jan. 17 after Sunday Jan. 9 sneak preview. The Event will then return at this hour on Feb. 28
10 p.m. -- Harry's Law, starting on Jan. 17 before Parenthood switches from Tuesdays on March 7

TUESDAY
8-10 p.m. -- The Biggest Loser
10 p.m. -- Parenthood for four episodes before Law & Order: Los Angeles supplants it on Feb. 8

WEDNESDAY
8 p.m. -- Minute to Win It, starting Jan. 5
9 p.m. -- Chase, beginning Jan. 12 until America's Next Great Restaurant replaces it on March 16
10 p.m. -- Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, on Jan. 12 after a two-hour episode the week before

THURSDAY (with the entire schedule taking effect on Jan. 20)
8 p.m. -- Community
8:30 p.m. -- Perfect Couples
9 p.m. -- The Office
9:30 p.m. -- Parks and Recreation
10 p.m. -- 30 Rock
10:30 p.m. -- Outsourced

FRIDAY
8 p.m. -- Who Do You Think You Are?, starting on Jan. 21
9-11 p.m. -- Dateline NBC, on Jan. 7

SATURDAY
8-11 p.m. -- various reruns

SUNDAY
7 p.m. -- Dateline NBC as usual
8 p.m. -- The Marriage Ref, starting March 6
9-11 p.m. -- The Celebrity Apprentice, also on March 6

Read more from Ed Bark at unclebarky.com.

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'The Larry Sanders Show': TV Greatness on DVD

November 4, 2010 10:31 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Underappreciated at Emmy time and under-seen on HBO, The Larry Sanders Show only grows in stature as time marches on through the late-night talk TV minefield.

All 89 episodes are now available via Shout! Factory, the video curator whose restoration projects and dedication to both the great and the bizarre merit yet another full-throated shout-out.

Larry Sanders (suggested $150 retail price but shop around; Amazon often has it under $100) weighs in at roughly 40 hours on 17 discs with ample bonus content and a 60-page booklet documenting the show's 1992-98 run. It's all as fresh today as it was back in the day, with Garry Shandling, Rip Torn and Jeffrey Tambor brilliantly funny and craven as Larry, producer Artie and sidekick Hank "Hey Now" Kingsley.

No series before or since has rolled the TV industry onto its back and exposed its underbelly with such mercilessly biting results. And on the big screen, only 1976's ahead-of-its time movie Network has played in the same league.

Much of this is due to Shandling's lifelong neurotic bent. He still seems terminably unable to come to grips with himself, making Larry David seem like Dr. Phil in comparison. But this also freed Shandling to follow his own distinctive beat and instincts during the course of this landmark TV series. Shandling's manifest insecurities are resplendent on-screen and in character. And he found the perfect trimmings in Torn and Tambor. Few if any comedic trios have ever clicked like this one, although The Three Stooges certainly had their moments.

The DVD add-ons are another matter, however. Shandling's "Personal Visits" with prominent Larry Sanders guest stars (taped in 2007 as part of a previously released best-of set) can be almost painful to behold. He's thoroughly discombobulated in the presence of Carol Burnett, who as herself went against the grain of a self-described "White Bread Woman" image by saying "I saw your balls" during Season 1's third episode.

"I loved it. I slept very well that night when I got home," she tells Shandling during their ad hoc reunion. In turn, he yammers and stammers about.

Another such interview, this one with Jon Stewart, is done over the telephone with video cameras trained on both of them. Stewart, playing himself, was the guy who replaced Sanders in HBO's fictional but all-too-true talk show world. In their 2007 interview, Shandling can't remember anything regarding how he hired Stewart in the first place. Not even their New York dinner with Billy Joel also in attendance, as Stewart relates it.

Shandling ends their conversation by asking Stewart what he should do next. "Lighten up," Stewart says in all sincerity. This seems to further muddy Shandling's waters. He has no idea how to react to such advice.

The overall brilliance of Larry Sanders exempts Shandling from doing anything next. Its Aug. 15, 1992 premiere episode, "What Have You Done For Me Lately?," got the show off to a roaring good start with a razor-sharp look at network interference.

The new and icy vice president of programming, Melanie Parrish (terrifically played through most of the series by Deborah May), insists that Larry do live commercials to please restive sponsors.

"In a fiscal sense, your show just isn't cutting it," she informs Larry and Artie, who later remarks, "I swear I killed her in the war."

Larry ends up messing around with spots for The Garden Weasel, wondering at one point why it's not called "The Amazing Ratstick." This doesn't sit too well with corporate, but toadying Hank is more than willing to help out with a smoothly rendered shill in a voice that could sell Popsicles in Antarctica.

Larry's very first monologue turns out to be eerily timeless. Referring to then presidential candidate Bill Clinton playing the saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, he notes that Jerry Brown "didn't actually play a number with the band [on Larry's late nighter], but he did score them some great coke."

Eighteen years later, Brown is politically reborn as the newly elected governor of California, whose voters on the same day decided against legalizing marijuana via Proposition 19.

Another monologue joke, about Ted Kennedy, falls pretty flat after his recent death from cancer. Larry notes that Kennedy just remarried. "And boy, he's going to be surprised when he sobers up, huh?"

The show's first monologue ends with Larry's trademark "Don't flip around" channel-changing advisory, which in slightly abbreviated form became "No flipping."

Larry of course loves watching tapes of himself on TV upon returning home to his wife, Jeannie (Megan Gallagher in early episodes). Artie also couldn't stop watching, even during a tryst in Venice with the real-life Angie Dickinson in Season 5's "Artie, Angie, Hank and Hercules" episode. In that same half-hour, the ever-supplicant Hank solemnly tells guest Don Rickles, "I knew television was in deep trouble the day they took CPO Sharkey off the air." Riotous.

Larry Sanders' cast of supporting players included several previously unknown performers who later scored in signature roles of their own. Among them are Jeremy Piven (Ari Gold on Entourage), Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe O'Brian on 24) and Penny Johnson (President David Palmer's duplicitous wife, Sherry, on the early seasons of 24).

Big-name guest stars playing themselves abounded, of course, never more so than on a one-hour series finale that still ranks as one of the great TV closers of all time. Jim Carrey's cavorting, much of it ad libbed, again steals that show amid the likes of Warren Beatty, Sean Penn, Carol Burnett, Ellen DeGeneres, Jerry Seinfeld, Clint Black, Jon Stewart, David Duchovny, Tim Allen and Greg Kinnear.

The series finale, originally shown May 31, 1998, includes a bonus audio commentary by Shandling and co-producer/writer Peter Tolan. As does the very first episode. But their byplay isn't as revealing or insightful as it could and should be. And that's kind of a shame.

Otherwise, it's all on the screen. Eighty-nine splendid episodes of a series that richly deserves a spot among the 10 greatest comedies in TV history.

See David Spade, as an up-and-coming young comic, explain to Larry why he double-dipped and did The Tonight Show in the same week: "Night after night, you want The Tonight Show. And I finally get it. Even though it's (bleeping) Leno now."

Watch David Letterman mess with Larry backstage at the American Television Awards in an episode that also includes Tom Snyder as a would-be late-night follow up act for both of them.

Check out Hank receiving and reading a profane fax intended as a missive from Larry to disparaging TV critic Tom Shales.

Witness Artie phonily beam and rave as aforementioned network executive Melanie Parrish disdainfully reacts to a guest list for Stewart's substitute shows. Namely, Sally Struthers, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Jamie Farr, Joan Embry and Charles Nelson Reilly.

Above all, re-appreciate the manifest show business insincerity and insecurity on the part of all involved. A dozen seasons after leaving HBO, The Larry Sanders Show still seems to have everything just right. And that's just beautiful.

GRADE: A

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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NBC News Draws the Line on Election Night

October 24, 2010 7:13 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

NBC News isn't about to acknowledge this publicly.

But Thursday's "unprecedented" decision to expand its Nov. 2 midterm election coverage into late-night hours seems like an obvious way to keep both Brian Williams and Tom Brokaw away from an increasingly partisan MSNBC. It's a clear line of demarcation between a broadcast network news division that still touts its objectivity and a cable sister whose new "Lean Forward" promotional campaign is aimed directly at the conservative Fox News Channel.

During previous big political events, NBC Nightly News anchor Williams and predecessor Brokaw have crossed over to MSNBC. That's largely because they had no place else to go once NBC News ended its coverage.

But MSNBC increasingly has become an uncomfortable spot to be in -- at least during nighttime hours -- if you're otherwise intent on presenting the news in a reasonably unbiased manner. The recent debut of Lawrence O'Donnell's 10 p.m. ET program gives MSNBC a quartet of avowedly left-of-center hosts, with Ed Schultz, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow the incumbents. Hardball maestro Chris Matthews is somewhat more evenhanded, but lately not so much.

On election night, at least, there apparently will be scant mixing and matching. NBC is preempting both The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon to give Williams, Brokaw and others a home of their own. They'll be joined by Meet the Press moderator David Gregory, correspondents Andrea Mitchell and Savannah Guthrie, and Washington bureau chief Mark Whitaker.

According to the NBC News publicity release, just two principal players will be crossing over. Political director/chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd and utility news anchor Lester Holt will divide their time between NBC and MSNBC.

MSNBC's all-night election night coverage otherwise will be unto itself, with Matthews, Olbermann, Maddow, O'Donnell, Schultz and contributor Eugene Robinson at the helm.

During the midsummer TV press tour in Beverly Hills, MSNBC president Phil Griffin [left in photo] was asked by unclebarky.com whether viewers are really well served by polar-opposite 24-hour news channels offering almost entirely different slants on just about every issue of import.

"We've carved out a place where we know there's a sensibility and there's an audience that likes it," he said in part. "And we've had a great deal of success, and we're proud of it."

O'Donnell [right in photo] added that "the audiences voted on this" and there are still "straight down the middle" presentations on both Nightly News and Jim Lehrer 's PBS NewsHour program.

"Do you want to imagine a world in which the Fox News Channel was doing what it was doing in prime time and everybody else was doing something that was much closer to what Jim Lehrer does?" he asked. "What would that feel like? And what would it feel like to an audience that disagrees with Fox's angle?"

Given what MSNBC has become, it's becoming of the NBC broadcast news division to separate itself on a night when partisan rhetoric will be flying from candidates' camps as two opposing cable news networks again go to war. MSNBC may be the "Place For Politics," but it's well past being a comfortable home for either Williams or Brokaw. It's about time that all concerned realized that, and made other accommodations for them.

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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Music and Passion Are Always in Fashion With Michael Feinstein

October 6, 2010 4:44 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Vocalist/pianist by night, collector/hoarder by day, here's a guy who knows what he likes.

Michael Feinstein worships the kind of music that never goes out of fashion but almost assuredly will never be fully fashionable again. In other words, it's hard to imagine someone downloading Alexander's Ragtime Band on iTunes.

PBS remains the cardigan sweater of TV networks, though. And that's a very good thing when it comes to the three-part, three-hour Michael Feinstein's American Songbook. It premieres Wednesday (Oct. 6 at 8 p.m. ET on New York's WNET/13, but check local public TV listings for premiere and encore times).

The program is a showcase for Feinstein's considerable talents and a testament to his persistence in preserving and re-recording tunes that otherwise might never be heard again. Discovering alternate lyrics to There's No Business Like Show Business and singing them with gusto is the kind of thing that sends Feinstein over the moon. He can't disguise his contempt for all the material that has been destroyed due to "the ignorance of people in charge."

Wednesday's first hour, subtitled "Putting on the Tailfins," finds Feinstein onstage, at an Indiana flea market, and knowledgeably dissecting performances from the likes of Frank Sinatra (whom he adores) and Rosemary Clooney (whom he adores even more). Composers George and Ira Gershwin also are gods to him. As a younger man, Feinstein regularly visited lyricist Ira, cheering the old man with his intricate knowledge of music from another era.

"I believe he lives in a different world," says his associate and live-in partner, Terrence Flannery.

Feinstein's parents, with whom he still seems to have a somewhat prickly relationship, say he was a perfectionist even as a little boy. Kids who came over to the house to play Monopoly were told to go home if they didn't play it Michael's way, recalls his mother, Mazia, in next Wednesday's second hour ("Best Band in the Land").

But she doesn't say this with any rancor. Feinstein may be persnickety and single-minded, but his overall net worth to society is off the charts. Whether performing the standards he loves (in about 150 shows per year) or rescuing the music of bygone times, he's a crooner/curator of considerable value. Who but Feinstein would have dug up Margaret Whiting's performance of One Hour With You from the World War II era, and then played it for her in her home? She's touched, he's beaming, and all seems right with the world.

Feinstein also documents the travails of black musicians and the sad irony of Harlem's segregated Cotton Club, where whites went to hear black music while blacks were denied admission. In the third hour ("A New Step Every Day"), he even makes a persuasive case for Al Jolson being an early version of Elvis Presley. Their hip gyrations were virtually identical, says Feinstein, who also notes that Jolson reveled in being a very sexual performer and lady killer. A vintage clip pretty much bears this out.

There's also a visit with Joe Franklin, the seemingly eternal New York City TV/radio interviewer whose storage areas are landfilled with stuff collected and strewn about. Even Feinstein looks a bit overwhelmed, but of course appreciates the value of being able to dig for buried treasure. An ancient piece of sheet music still makes his heart go pitter-pat -- as does a dusty tape of a onetime radio performance that otherwise would be forever silenced.

Feinstein's passions are fully communicated throughout these three hours. And each of them fittingly ends with his full-length performance of an old chestnut. At age 54, he's still vigorous of voice and messianic about recapturing and preserving the music that keeps him humming.

There are far worse things to do with one's life. And at least he's not a dedicated devotee of The Bay City Rollers.

GRADE: A

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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Wanna See William Shatner's Zucchini?

September 23, 2010 12:09 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

It really is a pain in the ass to correctly type the title of $#*! My Dad Says, which just as easily could be &%@! My Dad Says or even *&!$ My Dad Says.

CBS also notes that some DVR search functions are "perplexed" by the title. The network encourages viewers to instead go directly to their programming guides if they'd like to record this new sitcom rather than watch it live. Or as my late old man used to say, "Grease your fanny and slide on the ice."

Anyway, I'm going to eliminate the hieroglyphics and hereafter call this thing My Dad Says. Adapted from Justin Halpern's much more profane Twitter feed and a resultant bestselling book, it stars William Shatner in his first sitcom as the immensely cranky Ed (hey, no fair!!!). Living alone and marinating in his own bile, he's visited one night by youngest son Henry (Jonathan Sadowski), whom he hasn't seen in two years.

Ed cocks his shotgun in hopes it's an intruder. It is, but at least he recognizes him.

"I almost decorated my Buick with your balls," Ed bellows.

"C'mon, dad, you wouldn't do that to your Buick."

That's pretty much the tenor of Thursday's opener, in which Shatner labors through the rhythms of the live studio audience sitcom format while coughing up a steady stream of pointed and oft-blue insults that would make him a fine nursing home partner for Archie Bunker.

Henry, who's been laid off and is down to his last nickel, is looking for a way to ask Dad for money. But he also occasionally joins in the double entendre festivities, sensing an opening after complimenting Ed on the health of his garden.

"You should see my zucchini," Dad crows.

"I think I did last night when you answered the door in your jammies."

Older son Vince (Will Sasso) also drops by. He's married to domineering Bonnie (Nicole Sullivan). Both actors are former members of Fox's MADtv ensemble, so at least they know how to play off one another.

My Dad Says, which will follow CBS' transplanted The Big Bang Theory, loads up on coarse jokes the way the network's Mike & Molly dished out fat jokes in its Monday premiere. Future episodes of both series are likely to dial it down some. But broad wrecking-ball humor is initially slung in abundance.

"Son, if it looks like manure and smells like manure, it's either Wolf Blitzer or manure," Dad declares.

CNN's Blitzer might be pleased with any mention at this point. So maybe he'll be DVR-ing this episode -- providing he can figure out how to do it -- with an eye toward showing it to his grandkids.

Shatner on the other hand is already enshrined as Capt. James T. Kirk on Star Trek and Denny Crane on Boston Legal. This latest TV outing likely won't be making the cut in his personal time capsule. That is, unless he really enjoys watching himself exclaiming "It's shotgun time!" when a Girl Scout knocks on his door trying to sell him cookies.

GRADE: C

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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'Boardwalk Empire' Gives Jersey Shore a Good Name

September 17, 2010 3:12 PM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Longtime HBO corporate communicator Quentin Schaffer couldn't resist aiming a little slingshot at a certain high-flying MTV show during his introduction of a press tour session for Boardwalk Empire.

"HBO is proud to take you to the Jersey shore," he told TV critics last month. "The difference being you're going to see some great writing, some great directing and some great storytelling."

Well-played and certainly to the point. When the TV cream rises to the top, it's often as not on HBO. Add the fact that New Jersey's underside has been very good business for a premium cable network that birthed Tony "The Situation" Soprano and now is investing heavily in the state's formative gangland years with a socko series set in the Prohibition era.

Sumptuous in appearance and graphic in words and deeds, Boardwalk Empire builds on the already imposing mobster resume of Martin Scorsese (Goodfellas, The Departed, Gangs of New York). He co-executive produces this series with the likewise estimable Terence Winter, who wrote 25 episodes of The Sopranos.

Twelve episodes are scheduled for the first season, and HBO sent half of them for review. They're quite a feast, with Steve Buscemi moving from his usual supporting roles to top of the marquee as corrupt Atlantic City treasurer Enoch "Nucky" Thompson (modeled after the real-life Enoch "Nucky" Johnson).

Buscemi may not be physically imposing. But he's got the swagger and presence required to sell himself to viewers as a no-holds-barred wheeler dealer who gets what he wants -- and wants a lot.

Among those under his thumb is his somewhat dense brother, Elias (Shea Whigham), who provides muscle in his role as Atlantic City's sheriff. On the other side of the fence, rigid federal agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) is determined to clip Nucky's wings. Pious, single-minded and also desperately lonely and unforgiving of himself, Van Alden resorts to self-flagellation as a means of contrition. But that particularly jarring scene will be a while in coming.

Boardwalk Empire also is populated by three big-name, real-life gangsters in their "toddler" years, as Scorsese has put it in interviews.

Michael Stuhlbarg is particularly chilling as teetotaling fixer/gambler Arnold Rothstein, instrumental in the 1919 World Series "Black Sox" scandal. Charles "Lucky" Luciano (Vincent Piazza) is on the rise while also struggling with impotency. And Al Capone (Stephen Graham) is a crass lug of a thug with a deaf son and a boss who can still order him to "go clean the Buick."

The series also weaves in a fictional, up-and-coming gangster named Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt, in top photo with Buscemi). Newly returned from the combat horrors of World War I, Jimmy is banished by Nucky after his role in a liquor heist that ends in one too few fatalities. He ends up in Chicago, linked uneasily with the unpredictable, mercurial and always vicious Capone. The Jersey Shore and the Windy City are soulmates when it comes to rum-running for huge profit. And Boardwalk Empire meshes them perfectly without any loss of continuity or focus.

On the Jersey home front, Nucky also consorts with bimbo mistress Lucy Danziger (Paz de la Huerta), who pretty much fits a vintage nightclub comic's joke about how "my girl is so dumb she thought that daylight savings was a bank."

Recent immigrant Margaret Schroeder (Kelly Macdonald) also attracts Nucky's interest. She's got a brain and a value system, but is married to an abusive drunk. It's an intriguing triangle, with Lucy a haughty and spoiled material girl while Margaret slowly succumbs to the creature comforts Nucky can provide in return for keeping her mouth shut.

Nucky's overriding goal is to keep Atlantic City "wet as a mermaid's twat" while further lining his fat wallet. He's initially seen making a bogus speech at a Women's Temperance League rally, where he tells a concocted story about his own childhood experiences with the evils of alcohol.

Snow job completed, he counsels Jimmy on the "first rule of politics. Never let the truth get in the way of a good story."

Boardwalk Empire is splendorous in its depictions of a vintage Atlantic City boardwalk and the party scenes at Nucky's hangout of choice, Babette's Supper Club. But recurring violence likewise is part of the scenery. And there's no shortage of bared flesh either in Nucky's bedroom, at night clubs or on a slab in a morgue.

The writing is airtight and the acting a match for it. Dabney Coleman, for one, is seen only briefly as Commodore Louis Kaestner in the first six episodes. But he takes these scenes to the bank, with Buscemi capably along for the ride.

Much is always expected of HBO, which annually dominates the Emmy Awards and whose current pair of programming chiefs aren't shy about exuding a palpable and sometimes off-putting sense of entitlement. But the proof is in the pudding, as they said with more regularity back in Prohibition times. In that respect, Boardwalk Empire is the best new drama series of the fall season -- and probably a cinch Emmy pacesetter as well.

GRADE: A

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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'Outlaw' worth giving a second chance

September 15, 2010 11:29 AM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Outlaw's premise remains preposterous, but now at least merits an asterisk. That's because its second episode is so markedly better than Wednesday night's premiere preview (10 p.m. ET), which follows the high wattage season finale of NBC's America's Got Talent.

Let's review the not-to-be-believed basics. Jimmy Smits plays U.S. Supreme Court justice Cyrus Garza, who's first seen very publicly in a casino playing blackjack. "Bless me, father, for I need a four," he says. In real life that's an immediate viral video on YouTube and an around-the-clock gabfest on the alleged cable news channels.

Not that this would actually happen in real life. Likewise highly improbable is Garza's subsequent, prolonged debate with an anti-death penalty protester stationed outside the casino. She's in his face and then in his bed, sleeping off their sex together, while the womanizing Garza watches an old and suddenly cathartic Dateline clip of his deceased liberal father, Francisco, who died in a car wreck while Cyrus sat beside him.

"He's wrong. He's just wrong," pops tells an interviewer. "And deep inside of him -- he knows it."

Appointed by George W. Bush, Cyrus is "arguably the most conservative justice on the Supreme Court" and also the Sports Shooting Ambassador of the Year, according to a sign in the casino he frequents.

But he's about to flip after first hiring a slinky, sexy private eye named Lucinda Pearl (Carly Pope). She's seen lounging in Garza's office in a short skirt and black leather jacket. Smack-talkin' Lucinda -- "Well, I prefer strip poker, but I'm in" -- will be the newest member of Garza's crusading team of right-wrongers.

Their first case is a condemned man, convicted of killing a cop, whose attorney has petitioned the Supreme Court for a stay of execution. Garza breaks a 4-4 deadlock before abruptly resigning from the court to represent the same man he sided with as a justice. This very much vexes a right-wing senator who earlier had told Garza, "We put you in there. We can take you out."

Now that Garza has opted out, "you're on your own, pal," the sinister senator sneers. "I'd suggest you get a bodyguard." The implication is that Garza is being targeted for assassination. And oh yeah, he also has run up $250,000 in gambling debts.

So there you have it. Perfectly plausible, huh? Outlaw co-producer John Eisendrath, asked about the "heightened reality" during the recent network summer "press tour, preferred to position the show as "in some ways a little bit of a fantasy. Wouldn't you want this lawyer and this legal team to come to your city to represent you in the case that matters the most to you?" he asked your friendly content provider.

Co-producer David Kissinger, son of former secretary of state Henry Kissinger, agreed there's a "certain amount of license" taken in Outlaw. But back in his dad's heyday, Supreme Court justice William O. Douglas had quite a colorful streak, he noted. "The current group is probably, given the process that they have to go through, a little bit tamer." But with Douglas as a distant template, Garza's deportment is "not as far-fetched as I think you're suggesting," Kissinger contended.

Sorry, not buyin' it. But the premise isn't the only problem with Wednesday's unveiling of Outlaw. Smits' acting also is grating, whether he's barking out orders to his team or later sermonizing in a courtroom.

Conan O'Brien's Conaco productions is a partner in this enterprise. And it's almost as if he's sabotaging NBC with a series that initially seems ready-made for parody on his upcoming TBS late night show. He had a fine time twitting Walker, Texas Ranger on the Peacock's old Late Night with Conan O'Brien. So maybe Outlaw could step in someday. This is after all, a show where Garza's most trusted aide, Al Druzinsky (David Ramsey), asks the bossman, "How does it feel to be an outlaw?"

"Feels great," Garza says while I Shall Be Released supplies the musical backdrop. Guh-roan.

Meanwhile, sexy P.I. Lucina keeps lobbing sexual double entendres at semi-uptight team member Eddie Franks (Jesse Bradford). Such as when he's grillin' burgers and stuff at an episode-closing party while she snipes, "Just keep your meat on the plate."

Best keep that wiener in a bun, too. But after a truly dreadful pilot episode (encoring in NBC's regular time slot this Friday at 10 ET), Outlaw resumes on Friday, Sept. 24 with a second hour that tackles Arizona's super-controversial immigration law with an intelligent and against-the-grain approach.

At issue is the near-fatal shooting of a legal Hispanic resident by a cop who first detains him for supposedly acting suspiciously. Garza ends up representing the cop, to the considerable consternation of the loyal Druzinsky. This pits him against a federal attorney who has branded the white cop a criminal racist. Ed Begley Jr. drops in to effectively play the judge in the case.

This Outlaw episode retains some ridiculous excesses, including an ongoing subplot in which young team member/law clerk Mereta Stockman (Ellen Woglom) retains her crush on Garza to the considerable delight of tart-tongued Lucinda. All in all, though, this is an interesting and uncommon take on a volatile issue, with Garza seemingly proceeding at cross purposes by heavily stocking the jury with Hispanics. Smits' acting also is appreciably better in this episode. And the script is much improved.

So the jury is still somewhat out on Outlaw, which makes a terrible first impression and then regroups pretty impressively. Maybe there's still a way to make this work.

GRADES: Opening episode -- D; followup episode -- B+

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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CW's "Hellcats": Aaron Spelling, the Next Generation?

September 8, 2010 7:20 AM

By Ed Bark
unclebarky.com

Bootys are shaken -- after first being stirred -- on The CW's new Hellcats.

That may be reason enough for many to watch this first new fall series out of the chute. Trailing Wednesday's season premiere of America's Next Top Model at 9 p.m. ET, it's an abs 'n' ass answer to Fox's Glee. Instead of the occasional upbeat show tune or heartfelt ballad, viewers get a writhin', tumblin', sweat-poppin' college cheerleader tryout to "Popstar" by Pretty Little Problem...

In other words, "Cheer, Cheer for Old Notre Dame" has been supplanted by "Party like a rock star, shake it like a porn star." All on an academic scholarship, too, with coach Vanessa Lodge (Sharon Leal) willing to roll with the flow if it'll keep her program alive.

The principal Hellcats are pert 'n' peppy team captain Savannah Munroe (Ashley Tisdale segueing from her claim-to-fame Sharpay Evans role in the High School Musical movies) and incoming, 'tude-copping Marti Perkins (Aly Michalka). She's a pre-law student at Memphis' fictional Lancer University, where the sudden cancellation of her scholarship calls for desperate measures such as trying out for a vacant position as a, sniff, "football groupie."

"I'm not gonna let some grubby little goth insult the Lancer Hellcats," Savannah fires back. So it's on, even though Savannah, at heart, is a sweetie pie who later welcomes Marti as her roommate in the "Cheertown" dorm. Would she like wooden or padded hangers? Savannah has stocked their closets with a nice supply of both.

Marti's best pal, Dan Patch (Dallas native Matt Barr), happens to have the same name as a renowned turn-of-the-20th century, champion harness horse. But The CW's target audience of 18-to-34-year-old women is highly unlikely to know this. Just as Uncle Barky was ignorant of Pretty Little Problem's repertoire until googling. So it's a draw.

Both Dan and Marti have a strong aversion to cheerleading -- until she learns there's scholarship money to be had at the expense of an injured Hellcat named Alice Verdura (Heather Hemmens). While her wrist mends, count on her to plot non-stop against Marti, even to the point of stealing her towel in the girls' shower room. This leaves Marti in a fix until Alice's ex-boyfriend, sculpted Hellcat Lewis Flynn (Robbie Jones), comes to the rescue with a very odd bit of gamesmanship.

"Does this look crooked to you?" he asks after exposing himself to some leftover males in the locker room. "I think I might have slept on it wrong."

For some reason they flee in horror, acting as though they've just seen a giant predatory gila monster. This allows Marti to emerge from hiding.

Hellcats doesn't have a sinister Sue Sylvester -- at least not yet. It does have an embarrassing mother, though. Gail O'Grady (NYPD Blue, American Dreams) is back in harness as Wanda Perkins, a sloppy drunk who means well but makes her daughter want to run as though she's just seen a giant predatory gila monster.

As in Glee, the cheerleading competitions are threatened with extinction by funding cutbacks. So only by qualifying for Nationals can the Hellcats save themselves from being restricted to a mundane existence of merely jumping up and down at football games. And to be spared that fate, they'll have to out-booty vaunted Memphis Christian. In God we thrust.

One of Hellcats' executive producers is Smallville star Tom Welling, who soon will embark on his final season of playing Superboy turned Superman. This may seem like an odd choice for his first behind-the-camera excursion. But there are plenty of tight-fitting costumes. And Marti has been designated as the new featured "flyer."

Both Michalka and Tisdale act and cavort with vigor. So although Hellcats is patently ridiculous, it also seems largely harmless. As for higher education, viewers can learn en route to next week's big competition episode that Ronald Reagan, Meryl Streep, Katie Couric and Ruth Bader Ginsburg all were once cheerleaders.

So too was the late mega-producer and Dallas native Aaron Spelling (Dynasty, Charlie's Angels, Beverly Hills 90210 , etc.), who, were he alive today, might be making a series just like Hellcats.

Bet he'd find a role for Tori, though.

GRADE: C+

Read Ed Bark on lots more TV topics at unclebarky.com.

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Assessing the Emmy Telecast... And the Non-Delayed Emmy Webcast

August 30, 2010 11:00 AM

By Ed Bark

Jimmy Fallon proved to be an OK -- but not A-OK -- host of Sunday night's 62nd annual Emmys ceremony, which pitted the traditional NBC telecast against a companion live backstage webcast on nbc.com and other outlets.

Neither presentation held up for the entire night. Nor did the Big Four broadcast networks, which this time were beaten in the overall hardware haul not only by HBO, but by AMC.

ABC's three Emmys all went to Modern Family, including a statue for best comedy series that ended a three-year run by NBC's 30 Rock. AMC's Mad Men, at the same time, extended its best drama series winning streak to three years, while Bryan Cranston likewise made it three best actor Emmys in a row for his lead role in the cable network's Breaking Bad.

Cranston's co-star, Aaron Paul, took the best supporting actor Emmy trophy, while Mad Men added a best writing award. That gave AMC a heady total of four Emmys, while HBO waited until the three-hour ceremony was two-thirds over before reeling off eight straight wins in the movies and miniseries division. That included five awards for the night's most-honored program, Temple Grandin.

All told, cable networks won 17 of the 26 statues and figured in the night's two biggest upsets. Kyra Sedgwick broke through for the first time to win a best actress Emmy for TNT's The Closer, while the heavily favored Julianna Margulies of CBS' The Good Wife had to settle for presenting the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award to George Clooney, her former ER co-star.

CBS's The Amazing Race, winner of the best reality-competition series Emmy since its inception in 2003, had its seven-year winning streak snapped by Bravo's Top Chef.

Edie Falco won for her lead performance in Showtime's Nurse Jackie, which was entered as a comedy series but really isn't. Nor is Glee, for that matter, although it also competed with Modern Family in the funny business categories.

Falco termed her win "the most ridiculous thing that's ever happened" in the history of acting awards. "I am not funny."

Glee's openly gay Jane Lynch, the hardly surprising winner of best supporting actress in a comedy series, thanked both "my lord and creator Ryan Murphy" (the show's producer) and her real-life wife.

NBC barely avoided a shutout, winning a lone Emmy for its presentation of the 2010 Winter Olympics opening ceremony from Vancouver. But the Peacock probably was just as happy to dodge any Emmys for Conan O'Brien's work as the banished host of NBC's Tonight Show. A bearded O'Brien was in attendance, but the award for best variety, music or comedy program once again went to Comedy Central's The Daily Show, whose host, Jon Stewart, was a no-show.

The show began with Fallon's perhaps predictable, but nonetheless very entertaining, sendup of a Glee production number that included both cast members and recruited celebrities such as Tina Fey, Jon Hamm, Jorge Garcia, the inevitable Betty White, and the regrettable Kate Gosselin. The elongated sketch began on film and ended live on stage, with Fallon gamely tearing through Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Be Wild."

Other bits sagged in comparison, particularly the host's occasional use of solicited Twitter introductions of some presenters. Fey absorbed an "I'd hit that" tweet while ABC's Castle co-star, Nathan Fillion, withstood "this dude is straight off the meat rack, yo."

Fallon's guitar-strumming introductions of various Emmy categories, with help from some of the seated nominees, also fell more than a little flat. He fared a bit better with a lengthier "musical tribute to three shows we lost this year" -- ABC's Lost, Fox's 24 and NBC's Law & Order. Later, though, Fallon stooped to spout "these next presenters really suck" before the principal three stars of HBO's True Blood took the stage.

The night's acceptance speeches for the most part won't make any all-time Emmy highlight reel. It at least was an oddity, though, when best actor winner Al Pacino (for the HBO movie You Don't Know Jack) lauded Jack "Dr. Death" Kevorkian, who was in attendance.

"Thank you, Jack. You're all right, Jack," Pacino declared, enthusiastically shaking his right fist in support of the controversial MD. Kevorkian briefly stood to bask in a warm reception.

Ricky Gervais, who will return to host NBC's Golden Globes telecast next year, emerged as the Emmys' MVP (Most Valuable Presenter) after first promising to save "all the really offensive stuff" for the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's annual gala. "They're all drunk anyway," he reasoned before wondering why a guy couldn't get a beer -- even backstage -- at the Emmys.

Gervais then dropped Mel Gibson's name before quickly adding, "No, c'mon. I'm not gonna have a go at him. He's been through a lot. Not as much as the Jews -- to be fair."

That line easily got the night's biggest laugh before Gervais noticed that one of the best director nominees for a variety, music or comedy special was named Bucky Gunts.

"I hope it's Bucky Gunts" who wins, he said. "Because I didn't know you could say that on television. Let's face it. We're all Bucky Gunts here."

He then opened the envelope before gleefully exclaiming, "Bucky Gunts! Yeah!" Gunts, the lone NBC Emmy winner, then launched into a straight-ahead acceptance speech.

Finally, a few words on nbc.com's "Backstage" webcast, which utilized a "Thank You" Cam, "Green Room" Cam, "Makeup Room" Cam, "Producers Table" Cam, "Winners Walk" Cam" and "Jimmy Cam" during the course of TV's big night.

The latter was trained on host Fallon, who occasionally could actually be both heard and seen. Early in the proceedings, he rehearsed his introduction of presenter Matthew Perry before returning to the stage and repeating it for the TV broadcast. Not exactly scintillating, but if you like to see how the sausage is made...

The Green Room Cam muted the conversations of those stars waiting to take the stage. There were some interesting visuals, though, including Pacino cracking up at something Clooney said during their extended conversation. Webcast watchers also could witness presenter Tom Selleck milling about while discoursing with the likes of Ted Danson, Laurence Fishburne and, very briefly, January Jones of Mad Men.

Emmy's TV telecast utilized a seven-second delay in case something was deemed bleep-able. But the backstage webcast aired in real time. On a number of occasions, this meant that vigilant web listeners could learn who won the Emmy seven seconds before the TV audience did. Given the rapid-fire acceleration in communications, that someday will be considered an eternity. In fact, in some quarters, it already is.

The webcast endured beyond the precisely on time 11 p.m. ET end of the TV ceremony. Fallon closed out NBC's telecast by popping a champagne bottle and exclaiming "Tonight, after-party at Betty White's house!"

A minute or so later on the webcast, he could be seen backstage taking a swig of the bubbly before some of the jubilant cast members of Mad Men messed around at the "Thank You Cam."

All the while, a companion "Backstage" tweet screen continued to roll by at nearly the speed of closing credits on today's conventional TV telecasts. Mad Men's leading man, Jon Hamm, tried to keep it real.

"I'm bad with live things," he said while ducking away from the web cam's eye.

You can find a complete list of the night's 26 winners by going HERE.

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As a Sequel to Spike Lee's "When the Levees Broke," HBO's "Creek Don't Rise" Both Swims and Sinks

August 22, 2010 6:54 PM

By Ed Bark

Plainly speaking, New Orleans has never been in very good shape.

Poverty, greed, corruption and an overall laissez-faire "Big Easy" malaise have characterized the city since its sale to the U.S. in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase.

Then came Hurricane Katrina five summers ago. And on April 20th of this year, the British Petroleum (BP) oil rig explosion unleashed its gargantuan spill.

It's all more than enough to make a resident wonder aloud, "Do you want to stay livin' in a place like this?" Spike Lee raises that question early in If God Is Willing and Da Creek Don't Rise, the four-hour sequel to his acclaimed earlier HBO documentary, When the Levees Broke. And he basically revisits it repeatedly during a film that's far stronger in Monday's Part 1 than in Tuesday's second half.

Airing throughout this month and next on HBO, Creek Don't Rise premieres on Aug. 23-24 at 9 p.m. ET each night. It will be among a cavalcade of programming tied to the fifth anniversary of the Katrina devastation.

Those wounds, many still unhealed, were cauterized for a brief time by the New Orleans Saints' historic Feb. 7 Super Bowl win against the Indianapolis Colts. That's where Lee's sequel begins, after a powerful opening manifesto by author Phyllis Montana-LeBlanc (Not Just the Levees Broke) and a montage of the death and destruction dealt by Katrina.

The joyous chorus of "Who Dats?" on Super Bowl Sunday were only allowed to reverberate for two-and-a-half months before the BP Gulf oil spill went unchecked for a seemingly eternal 86 days. Lee thought he had his film in the can, but returned to document the latest catastrophe befalling this still dilapidated city. Or as musician Dr. John puts it at a rally, New Orleans once again "got the shaft."

Monday's first half of Creek Don't Rise excels in both its selection of interview subjects and its dissections of two major post-Katrina developments -- the demolishment of already badly decayed public housing projects and the closing of Charity Hospital. Lee obviously opposes both demises, but does give the other sides a hearing.

Former New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin, for one, believes that in reality only one of the housing projects might have been worth saving, even if their demolitions were accelerated when city officials saw a golden post-Katrina opportunity. Absent their residents, who fled the city, the tear-downs became all that much easier.

Some of the projects since have been replaced by "mixed income" developments that supposedly will mesh poor and well-off residents under essentially the same roof. But some see that as a utopian pipe dream while a neighborhood activist compares some of the new structures to a fashion model who looks good on the outside but is anorexic on the inside.

The smoldering debate over public housing gives way in Monday's Part 1 to the good will generated by actor Brad Pitt's "Make It Right" initiative to build affordable, well-made homes in New Orleans still storm-ravaged Lower Ninth Ward.

Those who see Pitt as the pampered co-star of "Brangelina" (with actress Angelina Jolie) can watch him walk the walk in this instance. Affixed with a scraggly beard and long-ish hair, Pitt says that "we rejected the idea that affordable housing has to use crap materials, toxic materials."

He has enlisted various architects in the "Make It Right" effort, with all of them contributing their designs pro bono. The result to date is more than 50 new homes at an average price of $150,000.

Creek Don't Rise also takes a side trip to Haiti, where actor Sean Penn has taken up residence in Port au Prince while helping the post-earthquake relief effort. Oft-maligned by Fox News Channel's arsenal of conservative personalities, Penn is another actor whose humanitarian efforts should be applauded unreservedly despite what one may think of his politics.

"The earthquake in Haiti (from where thousands of refugees migrated to New Orleans in the early 1800s) makes Katrina look like a delightful garden party," says Jacques Morial, co-director of the Louisiana Justice Institute.

Part One also has a revealing new interview with former FEMA director Michael Brown, of "Brownie, you're doin' a heckuva job" infamy. Brown, now an apparently prosperous consultant, notes how he can be seen wincing when President Bush laid that one on him. He admits to some mistakes in his handling of Katrina, but says that others in the Bush administration -- particularly Homeland Security head Michael Chertoff and defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- likewise were key contributors to the federal government's inept early response to Katrina.

Brown knows full well, however, that his obituary will be prominently marked by the "heckuva job" stain. But "not on the headstone, c'mon!" he retorts, when asked if it literally should follow him to the grave.

Alas, then comes Tuesday night's Part 2. It first dwells at length on New Orleans' mostly horrid public school system. Then it segues to rampant police corruption before spending much of its final hour recapping the BP spill.

Talking heads predominate -- back and forth, one after the other. Some of what's said still jumps off the page, as when Sen. John Kerry defends the Democratic administration's much-criticized handling of the disaster by asking rhetorically, "What's President Obama supposed to do, swim down there and close it off with his hands?" Kerry then predictably faults the Bush administration for its allegedly lax policies on drilling.

For the most part, though, all of this gets to be more than a little redundant, tedious or dreary, at times slowing the film's momentum to a crawl at best. The BP portion -- and Lee had little choice but to include it -- is a rather pro forma rehash of very recent events that remain fresh in the minds of most viewers. It will play better years from now. But in the here and now -- well, we've heard it all before.

Creek Don't Rise ends with all of the key participants literally framing themselves while reminding viewers who they are and what they do. It's worth sticking around to see the likes of Kerry, Brown, Penn, Pitt, Dr. John, CNN's Anderson Cooper and Democratic strategist James Carville all gamely playing along. Pitt, with a wisp of a smile, identifies himself as "self-employed."

GRADES: Part 1 gets an A-minus. Part 2 receives a C. For now.

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