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Must See TV, According to Me

7 May

For the past few years, at the start of every TV season, I’ve written a blog post about what shows I plan to watch.

But a funny thing occurred to me last week: I never do close the loop and let y’all know what shows I followed through on and am still watching at the end of the season.

After all, my “plans” are rather ambitious in September, what with so many new shows looking so promising and others getting a clean slate with a new TV season. That’s why it doesn’t take long for my DVR to get backed up, and for me to get behind on some shows.

If you’re like me, that may make you concerned that I’d spend all day and night watching TV.

Well, it gives me great pleasure to let you know I’m not a total couch potato.

And to prove it, here’s a week at a glance of what I’m watching now, or was watching until the show’s season ended: Continue reading →

5 Reasons Why “21 Jump Street” Isn’t as Bad as It Looks

20 Mar

If you’ve seen the promotional campaign for the big-screen reboot of 21 Jump Street, then you probably think it looks pretty bad.

That’s what I thought, too.

But then I saw the movie and was pleasantly surprised. It’s actually pretty good.

(Yes, I know that’s damning with faint praise.)

This flick had a lot of factors going against it, so I figured I would share the five things that are working for it, and that make 21 Jump Street worth seeing. Continue reading →

6 Things I’m Not Going to Apologize For

4 Oct

It’s the week between Rosh Hashannah and Yom Kippur.

The custom is you’re supposed to spend this time repenting for your sins and apologizing to people for anything bad you may have done to them during the year so that on Yom Kippur (which begins Friday night at sundown), you have a clean slate.

But I’m not the apologizing type, so I’m not gonna do that.

In fact, here are a few things I’m not sorry for: Continue reading →

Lots to Watch

19 Sep

Many people look forward to the fall.

They enjoy the cooler weather, the chance to start anew, and the return to normalcy after a vacation-filled summer.

But not me.

Each year around this time, the fall TV preview issues of Entertainment Weekly and TV Guide arrive in my mailbox and I’m reminded that for at least a couple weeks, I’m not going to have much of a life as I struggle to watch all kinds of new shows.

And if I do try to have a life, then my DVR is going to get a workout and I’ll be up late as I time-shift my TV watching.

I know, woe is me.

So allow me to continue an annual tradition of sharing which shows I’m going to try and watch this season.

Thankfully, a couple shows have already debuted, so I’ve already previewed them. One made the cut (Ringer) and one was knocked off my list (Up All Night). But plenty of others remain.

Here’s the list: Continue reading →

Conan the Destroyer

27 Jun

Last year, when Conan O’Brien was (unfairly) fired as the host of NBC’s The Tonight Show, he didn’t take it very well.

Viewers saw that in the days and weeks leading up to his last show, as he piled on the jokes at his soon-to-be-ex-employer’s expense.

And those of us who saw O’Brien’s Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour got a taste of that too, as each show included a few jabs at NBC and a bunch of self-deprecating jokes about the situation.

But behind the scenes was an even angrier person, and in the new documentary Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop, we get a chance to see a little more of that side. Continue reading →

2010’s Entertainment Stays with Me

31 Dec

A couple nights ago, I re-watched the series finale of Lost for the first time in about four months.

I’m happy to report that I enjoyed it as much, if not more than, I did when the episode first aired in May, and the last time I watched it back when the DVD was first released in August — and that’s not just because I’m still blown away by how great Evangeline Lilly looked in that black dress.

That’s a relief, because when the finale aired, I was lamenting the end of one of my all-time favorite TV shows.

The last episode of Lost not only lived up to the hype, but it endures and continues to be great. Continue reading →

Happy Hanukkah, Greenberg’s Delicatessen!

24 Dec

On this, the day of Christmas Eve, allow me to wish all my non-Jewish readers a very merry Christmas.

My “gift” to you is this clip from Turner Classic Movies, which shows It’s a Wonderful Life as it was originally intended: As a Hanukkah story.

Enjoy, and ho ho ho!

It Wouldn’t Be the Holidays Without Her

23 Dec

A few years back, I got into a discussion with a friend when I told her how much I love Christmas.

“No,” she clarified. “You love the Christmas season. You don’t have to deal with the family and the religious stuff.”

She was right about all of that. I’m a huge fan of the season, with the pagentry and the lights and the deals and the happier mood and the lighter workload and the food and the celebrations and the traditions and yes, the music.

Oh, how I love the music of the Christmas season. Continue reading →

Chatting About Culture with Mr. Crane

3 Dec

There’s a pretty good chance that David Hyde Pierce won’t see this.

That’s because when I interviewed him for Continental magazine a few months back and I asked him about whether he uses social media and is on Facebook or Twitter, the erstwhile Niles Crane responded rather quickly and tersely, “I’d rather die.”

Alright, fine. So that subject was a dead end.

But thankfully, there was plenty else for us to discuss, and some of that conversation is now on planes and on the magazine’s website for all to read. Continue reading →

What’s the Story?

22 Nov

Morning TV news programs get a gentle tweak in Morning Glory. In the film, Rachel McAdams plays Becky Fuller, an ambitious television producer, who’s hired to breathe life into Daybreak, the fourth-place network morning show. Her solution is to hire gruff veteran newsman Mike Pomeroy (Harrison Ford), who begrudgingly takes the job of sitting alongside the show’s longtime host, Colleen Peck (Diane Keaton), even though he wants nothing to do with the silly antics and lightweight stories. But when the show is threatened with cancellation, all must do whatever it takes to keep Daybreak on the air.

Morning Glory was written by Aline Brosh McKenna, who also penned the screenplay for The Devil Wears Prada, and there are plenty of similarities between the two films. For example, both feature a perky, go-getter heroine who puts work ahead of her personal life, and both feature winning performances by their lead actresses. In this case, McAdams deserves all the credit for why Morning Glory is enjoyable to watch, even when the rest of it isn’t. McAdams helps the screenplay seem better than it is. She’s playing such a peppy, high-spirited person — and she does it so well — that I half-expected Ford to bark at her the famous Lou Grant line, “You’ve got spunk!” (Instead, he tells her she’s got moxie.) But it’s true. After starring in Wedding Crashers, McAdams stayed away from the breezy, lightweight romantic comedies she was offered, and she held out for a decent one. I couldn’t help but think that if Katherine Heigl, who starred in another McKenna film, 27 Dresses, had played Becky, this would have been a much worse film.

Which is not to say that Morning Glory is a masterpiece, or even on the same level as Prada. The first half of the film is better than the second, and other than McAdams, none of the other leads have much to work with; they can’t save the one-note characters they’re playing (Ford especially). And, it should be noted, it’s hard to take a film too seriously when it’s centered around a television network with the unfortunate name of IBS. Yes, Becky saves the show and manages not to lose her boyfriend (Patrick Wilson) in the process. But the fact that she makes Morning Glory watchable is her real triumph. I’m giving the film a B.

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