Shelley Winters - 1920-2006

I once said told Stephen Cooke and Tom Sutpen that if you saw Joan Blondell at the stage of her career when I first encountered her, you would never have thought of her as a sex symbol. The same holds true of Shelley Winters. She was a sex symbol at one point in her career. She was a blonde bombshell before Marilyn Monroe - who was her one-time room mate and who by all reports she taught to hold her head in a particularly sexy way - but she tired of it and became what Monroe later wanted to become, a damned good actress with two Oscars and a host of roles in the 1950s that were important and influential. But that wasn't my Shelley Winters.

My Shelley Winters was Mrs. Rosen in the original Poseidon Adventure (her fourth Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor - the photo I have here is of Shelley with her Poseidon Adventure "husband" Red Buttons on the Oscar red carpet many years later), and Julie Andrews (probably bisexual) superagent in S.O.B. (and yeah I watched that movie to see Julie Andrews's boobs, and yeah it was worth it). It was the Shelley who did one shot guest appearances in a variety of unworthy TV shows starting in around 1966 with Batman (as "Ma Parker"). She was apparently memorable in her final major TV role as Nana Mary in Roseanne where she played Estelle Parson's mother despite being only seven years older than her (I never watched Roseanne mainly because I loathe Roseane Barr). But most of all my Shelley Winters was the queen of the talk show. Take a look at her IMDB filmography. Go below the 130 listed parts in movies (mostly theatrical), 20 appearances as herself - several as an Oscar presenter - to her "Notable TV Guest Appearances". There they sit, her talk show appearances on both sides of the Atlantic. These started in 1957 when she did The Steve Martin Show, and included appearances in Britain on something called Late Night Lineup, on Parkinson and it's successor at the BBC Wogan twice each, and even on Ruby Wax's The Full Wax twice. Her last "chat show" appearance - I suppose his qualifies - was on Inside The Actors Studio (something for which she was eminently more qualified than most people who appeared on the show - not only had she attended the Actors Studio, she taught there). She did one episode of the NBC Letterman series Late Night with David Letterman, but her true venue was The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson. Between March 1970 and March 1991 she made twenty-one appearances on the show. Twelve of these appearances occurred between March 1970 and July 1973. She was a much less frequent guest in the 1980s and early 1990s when I saw her.

Shelley Winters was in her element on Carson. She was outrageous. When I saw her, it always seemed as though she's lubricated herself very well with the backstage booze supply. She'd come out and usually talk about Hollywood in the old days and talk about sex lives - her own and others. They played up her often imperfect memory - I remember one sequence where she couldn't remember the name of one of Johnny's wives, which was important to the story. But some of her most memorable performances occurred before I was able to see the show. In 1969 she was responsible for spreading the incorrect rumour that Jerry Mathers (from the movie The Trouble With Harry and the TV series Leave it to Beaver) had died in Vietnam. But perhaps her most infamous performance was when she dumped an ice bucket full of ice and water over the head of Oliver Reed after Reed made some remarks about women that Shelley took exception to. (I have a suspicion that this tape no longer exists, erased as so many of those early shows were. Too bad - Reed got what he deserved and she was the perfect person to give it too him.) It's worth noting I suppose that that was Reed's first - and last - appearance on The Tonight Show while Shelley made a dozen more appearances, the last just a few months before Johnny's final show

Shelley Winters was a great actress, a great character actress, and a great character. Expect TCM to do a retrospective sometime this week, much to the irritation of people who foolishly believe that a schedule should be sacrosanct.

A Family In Crisis Doesn't Need A Laugh Track

I noticed something odd when I was watching the new ABC series Crumbs tonight. No, it wasn't the overbearing laugh track. Oh I noticed it and I'll get into that in a bit, but the decision to use it and with such a heavy hand was scarcely odd, more like about what one would expect the network to demand for this sort of show. No what seemed odd - and maybe it was just me - but sometimes it seemed as if some of the lines weren't exactly in synch with the movements of the characters' mouths. This seemed to happen a lot with Jane Curtin's character, and to a lesser extent with William Devane's character. At times it seemed almost as if the actors redubbed their lines after scenes had been shot, some of them not quite the same as what had been originally said. For reasons I can't explain this bothered me somehow even though, as I said, it could just have been me.

We are introduced to the Crumb family when youngest son Mitch receives a call from his mother Suzanne. She's getting out of the "sanitarium" (what in less sensitive time and for less well off people was called the mental hospital). Mitch is in California where his family believes that he's a successful (and straight) screenwriter, but he decides to fly back to Connecticut to help her to get readjusted - and to keep her from trying to kill her ex-husband again. She was put in the sanitarium for trying to run over her husband Billy and the girlfriend he left her for after thirty years. In Connecticut he reunites with his older brother Jody, the rather immature chef who now runs the restaurant that his parents started. Jody is devoted to his mother, and hates his father for leaving the business and Suzanne. He also deeply resents Mitch apparently for having the "good life" in California. As for their father, Mitch finds him in the hall closet after the brothers get their mother home. He's picking up the last of his stuff to finish moving in with his girlfriend. Billy might have come back but she's pregnant, and he's starting a new life as a "past life massage therapist".

The fact is that all of the characters are hiding secrets, some of which emerge. While Suzanne may hate her ex-husband she moved on too, in the form of a very large African-American orderly named Elvis who she met at the psychiatric facility. Mitch hasn't told his family that he's gay and that the "girl" that he tells them about is in fact his boyfriend (and his shrink). Suzanne of course knew since Mitch was a teen that he was gay and was just waiting for him to tell the family. Nor does he tell them that while he wrote one hit movie, his writing career is stalled. The big secret is about Billy's girlfriend being pregnant. When Mitch blurts this out while trying to convince Suzanne that Billy isn't coming back it sets her off on what seems to be a homicidal rage. Suzanne finds Billy at his new job and pulls a gun on him. Her sons are close behind but aren't exactly effective in disarming her. She pulls the trigger on the gun...which turns out to be one of those lighters shaped like a gun.

Hanging over the family and most of the stresses that they experience is a family tragedy, the death of the third brother, Patrick, in a boating accident a number of years ago. Jody's resentment of Mitch really stems from the fact that he left as soon as he could and then wrote a screenplay about the tragedy which for Jody was all the more real because he was supposed to be with the brother when the accident happened. Jody isn't able to write a new movie because the screenplay he created for his big hit was so personal to him. It may be all that he could have written. Their mother's crutch in the crisis was being with her family and that was shattered when Billy suddenly left her. As for Billy for all that he believes that his affair was just a case of flirting that got carried away, it seems obvious that he was coping by breaking away from his family. In a very real sense this is a family in crisis, one which is finally acknowledging a part of their problems and maybe starting to heal. Of course since this is a comedy, the humour isn't in the actual healing but in never getting much beyond the first step. Inevitably Suzanne will never fully reconcile herself with Billy leaving and will continue to want revenge. Jody will continue to be mad at Mitch despite the fact that his younger brother has moved back home to become the manager of the restaurant (allowing Jody to spend more of his time on the cooking). But that's okay. Dysfunction in and of itself can be funny.

This of course is where the Laugh Track comes into the equation. I am not totally opposed to Laugh Tracks; used properly and with a certain surgical precision they can sweeten the reaction of a live audience and give a joke that received a lukewarm response to a somewhat higher level. Unfortunately the person who was in charge of the laugh track for this show had the subtle hand of a drunk with a sledge hammer, and apparently no live audience response to sweeten. Every funny line or incident gets one of those over the top reactions that is the hallmark of a badly used laugh track, and it sometimes seems as though the same sequence of laughter was used over and over again. It's as if the producers are determined to tell us "This is the funny bit, you laugh here" just in case we didn't recognise it. I feel more than vaguely insulted.

I'm not sure about the cast either. Just about everyone is talking about this the return of Fred Savage to network TV as though he was gone longer than his time on the series Working would have indicated. He's nice enough but he seems to mostly be playing the "straight" man in this one, at least so far. For me this series is all about the marvellous Jane Curtin as the bitter angry medicated Suzanne. Sure she chews the scenery and has the sort of wild-eyed look that makes you want to lock up the china, but she is absolutely letter perfect for this part. I have more of a problem with William Devane but I suppose that's because I'm not a huge fan of Devane as a comedic actor. He always comes across to me as though he's trying too hard to be funny and that's also true in this show. Rounding out the Crumb family is Eddie McLintock as Jody. I'm not sure what I can say about him beyond the fact that he plays off of the other actors reasonably well even though, as yet, his character is little more than an immature kid in a man's body.

I think I'm being influenced by something I read about this show today (actually I know I am) but I think it's accurate - Crumbs is trying a bit too hard to let you know that it's something different. Moreover, I'm not sure that ABC really knows how to handle different. This show is a big departure from According To Jim or Faith And Hope - heck it's a big departure from Emily's Reasons Why Not and Jake In Progress (and given that the network has pulled both of those next Monday for a double dose of The Bachelor we know how those two are working out) - and I don't think the network is too sure of their footing here. Sure they want the sort of critical acclaim that a show like Arrested Development gets, but they don't quite want to go as radically different as that show is. The net result is neither fish nor fowl - it doesn't stray far enough from conventional to truly stand out but is far enough out that it's going to have a tough time catching people who want conventional. I'm also going to suggest that the network doesn't have that much confidence in the show. They're hoping that the people who watch Dancing With The Stars will stay on ABC for this but if they must have known that they'd be going up against a truly different show in The Office, which means that they're burning Crumbs off as a good idea that didn't quite gel. If you're in the market for a comedy that's different from the run of the mill, change the channel after Dancing With The Stars and watch The Office.

TV On DVD - January 10, 2006

A little late but I had to deal with some browser troubles earlier on Tuesday so I'd like to think I'm excused. Another week with a small but interesting list. Of particular note is the fact that over half of the sixteen titles this week are British series, some of which appear to have had either limited release in North America or none at all. Some of them seem rather interesting.

Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda: Season 5, Collection 3
- By the time Season 5 of Andromeda appeared I had dropped the series, and although I've seen some episodes from Season 4 I've felt no reason to pick it up. What I find of interest in this package is two things: the cost and the fact that for the price you're only getting four episodes. The price is the equivalent of what you'd pay for a full season of something like NYPD Blue so the question becomes what makes this "worth it"? The fact is that there doesn't seem to be a really good answer that I can find. Assuming that this season is collected in a boxed set as the other seasons have, you are probably better off to wait for that to happen as the price appears to be significantly better than buying the season bit by bit, even if you do apparently have to deal with "flippers".

As Time Goes By: Reunion Special
- PBS has apparently decided to move quickly to release the As Time Goes By Reunion specials to DVD in the United States. These originally aired in Britain at the end of December 2005, so this is quick work. Worth buying? Well if you're a fan of the show or if your a fan of either Dame Judy Dench or Geoffrey Palmer, then I'd say most definitely.

Black Books: The Complete First Series
- Another British series, and one which I can't recall having seen, or even heard mentioned until this DVD release (which I suppose should indicate that it has aired her and I've just missed it). About "a foul mouthed, eccentric, misanthropic Irish drunkard" who owns an independent book store despite the fact that he doesn't like the people who buy books and frequently directs his insults at them. Oddly enough this sounds more interesting than some of the stuff I have seen from Britain recently.

The Flash: The Complete Series
- I loved this show, and surprisingly I didn't like it as much as my brother did. In part I loved the series because it was self-referential and often seemed to overindulge in "in jokes" like the time when The Flash raced by a theater showing a double bill of Superman and Batman, or an address being at the corner of Carmine and Infantino (or was it Infantino and Giordano?). Comic geeks got jokes like that. The series also had some great villains played by surprising people - Mark Hamill as "The Trickster" in two episodes, and David Cassidy as "The Mirror Master". The series never caught on with the general public however and was cancelled after one season. The DVD set includes the pilot however one weakness is that it contains no extras at all. Still a must have for fans of the comic book or the series. That means YOU Greg.

Hee Haw, Vol.5 (Dolly Parton)
- Hee Haw was never loved by the sophisticated audience or the urbane urban audience but it had something going for it - corny (in every possible way) humour. In what seems to be a single episode, Volume 5 features Dolly Parton, and regular cast members Lulu Roman and Barbi Benton.

The House Of Eliott: Series Two
- I remember liking the first season of The House Of Eliott but as it continued it increasingly became essentially a period soap opera. It's another one you should buy if your a fan.

Men Behaving Badly: The Complete Series, Vol. 3
Men Behaving Badly: The Complete Series, Vol. 4
- Men Behaving Badly is another of those British series which is impossible to recreate in America... and they did try. There are a lot of reasons. For one thing it was nearly impossible to recreate the chemistry that leads Martin Clunes and Neil Morrisey had with each other, and for another thing I don't think the American producers ever let their characters be as thoroughly loutish as the British characters were. Tony and Gary are about as far away from anything you'd want your son to be - or worse, your daughter to be sleeping with - but of course that's part of what made the show wildly successful. In fact in 1996, during BBC Television's 60th anniversary, it was voted the corporation's best sitcom ever.

Nighty Night: The Complete Series
- Another British "comedy" that I don't know has ever been released here in North America. Julia Davis plays Jill Tyrrell, a who isn't about to let a little detail like her husband being cured of cancer interfere with her being a "cancer widow". This allows her to gain the sympathy of her employees, have an affair with the husband of her neighbour (who has multiple sclerosis), and troll dating services for wealthy men to possibly marry. To say that this is dark is probably an understatement given the number of murders and affairs that go on. Still, it's the sort of thing one can readily imagine from the British.

Red Dwarf: Series 7
- Red Dwarf is one of the great comedic science fiction series. The circumstances surrounding the seventh season which was made four years after the sixth were rather complicated. Craig Charles (Lister) had been accused of rape and exonerated, while Chris Barrie starred in The Brittas Empire, which explains why, when the series eventually returned, Rimmer wasn't always present. There were a number of other changes including bringing back a version of Kochanski (although played by Chloe Annett rather than Clare Grogan). Indeed much of the conflict in this season of the series consists of battles between the mechanoid Kryten and Kochanski over their relationship with Lister. I found it harder to get into than previous seasons, although nowhere near as difficult as Season 8.

Rising Damp, Series 1
- Considered one of the greatest British comedies of all time, Rising Damp is yet another one that I've never seen, although I'm sure it has been available in North America at some point, so the problem has obviously been my inability to find it. The series was adapted from a play called The Banana Box and starred three of the original cast members. It dealt with the inhabitants of a decaying townhouse that had been turned into a rooming house by its miserly owner. The newest tenant is a man with a "posh" who rented the apartment over the phone - he turns out to be black and claims to be an African prince (the play had been inspired by the story of a black man who lived for a year in a hotel by pretending to be an African prince to avoid discrimination).

Strong Medicine Season 1
- I'm pretty sure this one has aired in Canada, on the W Network, but their website doesn't list it as being on their schedule, but if it was there, it explains why I've never seen it - W Network is very much like the show's originating network in the US, Lifetime in that it tends to be aimed at women. Obviously, since I haven't seen it I can't judge.

Urban Gothic: Season 1
- Another British series, this time for Channel 5, which apparently was seen on Bravo here in Canada (which is very different from Bravo in the US), although I have no recollection of it. Beyond the fact that it was a half hour horror anthology from a network that isn't renowned for good or polished programming, I can't tell you much.

Viva la Bam - The Complete Fourth and Fifth Seasons
- Yet another series that I've never seen and again I'm not sure it has ever aired in Canada - if it did it was on the short lived MTV Canada. These are the last two seasons of the show.

Mutual of Omaha's: Wild Kingdom Hunters of the Sky
Mutual of Omaha's: Wild Kingdom African Wild 2
- Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom (to give it the full title) was for many years a staple around our house, and who cares about Johnny Carson's old gag about Marlin Perkins sipping martinis back at camp while Jim is out wrestling alligators - it was a funny bit but you (and Johnny) knew that old Marlin was out there too. These two sets from Brentwood Video offer ten episodes each; based on price alone this must be a single "flipper" disk. Even so, probably worth it if you're into this sort of wildlife programming.

Watch This? Why Not

I just got around to watching Emily's Reasons Why Not thanks to my Monday schedule which keeps me from establishing many ties to TV shows on that night. I tape a couple of shows (Las Vegas and CSI: Miami) and will be taping 24 once it gets back, but for the rest of the shows I normally don't even have time to sample them. I'll catch them in reruns... if they make it that long. Still if you're going to review you should make an effort, so I taped the series premiere of Emily's Reasons Why Not and the season premiere of Jake In Progress and I tried Emily on Tuesday night.

Heather Graham plays Emily, and I have to admit that she's damned cute. Now that shouldn't really matter but for some reason the main characters in this series sort of look the way their characters "should". It's kind of hard to explain but let's take Emily herself. According to the setup, explained in the first minute or two of the pilot, Emily is a young woman who has never had any difficulty in finding reasons not to do things she shouldn't do. This trait has, over the course of the years, apparently kept her for starting smoking (my VCR cut off the first 30 or so seconds of the show so I missed most of the childhood scene that introduced the character) and led her to become a successful editor with a major New York publishing house. The only place where her ability to find reasons not to do something has perpetually failed her has been with regard to the male of the species. In the words of the song, she "falls in love too easily". Most recently she's been involved with Reese, one of her authors, who has written a book called "Hook, Lie And Sinker: The Lies Men Tell Women And The Lies Women Tell Themselves". Clearly, just the act of hooking up with this guy on anything other than a one night stand basis and being surprised when she finds that he's been cheating on her is absolute proof that Emily is hopelessly naive about men. Either that or she's hopelessly optimistic about them which in this case is much the same thing. Which is where Heather Graham's appearance comes in. She has that naive, hopeless optimist vibe going right from the start in no small part because of the way she looks. It certainly doesn't hurt that she's a good enough actress to go beyond just appearance, and at the same time convince us that she's good at her job.

Appearance also plays into the two female members of Graham's supporting cast, Nadia Dajani as Emily's best friend Reilly and Smith Cho as her bitch of a colleague (and former assistant - she was promoted after claiming one of Emily's ideas for her own) Glitter Cho. Dajani has the appearance of someone who has been through the mill a few times and as a result has developed a crusty cynical exterior that Emily lacks. Reilly works with Emily's other best friend Josh (played by Khary Payton) a gay man who has recently moved in with his boyfriend Aknad. Of the three he's got the most stable relationship. When the two of them commiserate with Emily after her break up with Reese, Reilly is unable to resist an oblique "I told you so", which leads Emily to vow to look harder for reasons not to become involved with a man.

Emily's resolve is tested almost immediately when she meets a new man "Stan from marketing". They hit it off almost immediately and start dating. Even Glitter expresses her "approval" by cattily (is it possible to be catty and a bitch?) saying that she'd move in on him if he wasn't taken and then trying as hard as she can to bring Emily and Reese back together. Stan and Emily have fun together and it's almost perfect except for one thing: Stan won't kiss her. In fact any attempt at intimate contact seems to repulse him and when she finally gets him to sleep with her, that's what he does - sleep. Reilly and Josh have suggested that Stan could be gay, although Reilly informs them that some of the best sex she ever had was with a gay man who was trying to prove to himself that he wasn't gay - he kept trying to prove it over and over again for hours on end. Emily doesn't believe them until "evidence" starts to mount up: when Stan sleeps with her he actually sleeps with her, Stan wears makeup (specifically bronzer), Stan subscribes to Martha Stewart Living. The capper is when she tells Reese that Stan is an expert at Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and he bursts into a laughing fit calling it the "gayest sport ever". Going with her to see Stan participate in it Josh and Aknad tell her that this is very gay behaviour, and of course when your gay friends say he's gay he must be gay. Emily breaks up with Stan but does it in a very "male" way - she leaves a message on his voice mail (again her judgement in matters related to men is absolutely faulty). The punch line - and of course there has to be a punch line - is delivered by Glitter. She met Stan's sisters the night before and she knows a secret; Stan is a Mormon and a virgin. Unfortunately Emily doesn't find this out until after Stan and about four of his colleagues in the marketing department hear the voicemail break up.

I mostly enjoyed Emily's Reasons Why Not and a lot of it has to do with Heather Graham. She manages to to pull off the goofy side of Emily's personality in a believable manner. Nadia Dajani is solid as the cynical best friend. If I have to find fault with the casting it might be with Khary Payton who seems to be pushing the gayness of his character rather aggressively, coming close to the edge of stereotyping. The smile he gets when watching the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is a little bit too much. Smith Cho seems to be there to serve in whatever manner the writers want her to function in - meddler, wannabe Cupid (if being Cupid means she gets a shot at Stan by putting Emily back with Reese) and bringer of what in most situations would be good news. Maybe I just don't have a good read on Glitter yet. As for the show itself, there seems to be a desire in some quarters to compare it to Sex And The City, perhaps because, like Sex And The City it is based on a novel, this one by Carrie Gerlach. Beyond this I don't see the similarity, unless perhaps it's Sex And The City with Charlotte as the lead character. Carrie (or even Charlotte) was never as naive about men, or driven by her hormones, as Emily seems to be. Emily seems to have more in common with Ted from How I Met Your Mother than she does with the women of Sex And The City in terms of trying to find the right "one" in a city full of wrong ones. That's not to compare the two series though. How I Met Your Mother has what I can only describe as a warmer sensibility about it. The supporting characters so far seem more likable. In this Emily does seem to have something in common with Sex And The City.

On the whole I liked Emily's Reasons Why Not - and certainly I found it more appealing than I ever have the show that follows it in ABC's new Monday night lineup, Jake In Progress. The writing seems good and if they can sustain it over the long haul it should be okay. The big problem I see - besides 24, Las Vegas and the CBS comedy lineup - is that I'm not sure the premise will be able to sustain a lengthy run. The premise (based on seeing one episode of course) seems to be Emily meets a guy and becomes "smitten", Emily begins to develop doubts about the relationship, Emily find reasons to end it - valid or not, Emily takes solace in her friends and professional life while looking for the next Mr. Right. How many times can you repeat that before it starts to get old? Of course, given the competition it might not get the chance. It's a show you should at least try to see once while you have the chance.

New Poll - What Was William Shatner's Greatest Star Trek Performance?

This is apropos of virtually nothing, except that Mark Evanier mentioned the William Shatner DVD Club (no I'm not kidding) as one club he won't be joining, and they had a poll about the grand old man's greatest Star Trek performance. Of course they missed some so I've decided to do my own poll.

This of course is not to be disrepsectful of Shatner's other work. Who can forget his emotional work on TJ Hooker? Or indeed his self-referential scenes in Showtime where he tries to show Robert DeNiro how to slide gracefully across the hood of a car? DeNiro and Shatner - with Eddie Murphy - how is even the silver screen able to handle all that greatness? Not to mention the character of Walter H. Bascomb in the Tekwar series - a concept so great it could only have sprung from the pen of William Shatner. Or how about that early episode of Man From U.N.C.L.E. which not only featured Shatner as a guest star but also Werner Klemperer and Leonard Nimoy. Classic. And how can we possibly forget his performance in Big Bad Mama which featured Shatner in all his naked glory - something to which Angie Dickinson can attest (although anyone who has ever seen the film will state that he definitely got the best of that deal). Even his small work is memorable; how can anyone forget his Priceline commercials - heaven knows I've tried.

(Okay that paragraph was mocking. The fact is that William Shatner has done some good acting. "Denny Crane" is a great comedic part, and a lot of his best acting was early in his career - before he went to Hollywood and was working on the stage. He played a memorable "Romeo" at the Stratford Festival in its early years for example.)

Anyway, here are the performances that the William Shatner DVD Club mentions along with a couple of additional options to round the list out.

Post any other suggestions in the comments please.

But Surely It Obvious?

You are a GRAMMAR GOD!


How grammatically correct are you? (Revised with answer key)
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Congratulations! If your mission in life is not already to preserve the English tongue, it should be. You can smell a grammatical inaccuracy from fifty yards. Your speech is revered by the underlings, though some may blaspheme and call you a snob. They're just jealous. Go out there and change the world.


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Poll Results - What Was The Big TV "Moment" Of Calendar 2005?

First off, apologies to everyone. I had every intention of reviewing The Book Of Daniel on Friday but Friday morning I woke up with a monster headache and it only got worse through the day - let's put it this way, if Bin Laden and Bush each had this headache the world would have been in big trouble. Basically I'd say I felt like crap through the weekend, but that would be an insult ... to crap.

To the poll. I asked what the big TV "moment" of 2005 was. Voter turnout was less than in the past two polls with 6 voters this time around. I think we can blame the nature of the question for that one. The final episode of The Amazing Race 7 and ABC's memorial to Peter Jennings finished in a tie for fifth with no votes. Randal telling Trump not to hire Rebecca on The Apprentice and Tom Cruise's behviour on Oprah and The Today Show tied for third place with one vote (16% of the total) each. In a tie for first place was the episode of CSI directed by Quentin Tarantino and Kanye West's statement that "George Bush doesn't care about black people." on the NBC Katrina benefit show with two votes (33%) each.

Interesting that three of the four vote getters were live events. The spontaneity of live and generally unscripted television (West had a script but had told Mike Myers before hand that he was going to go off script) is hard to beat for providing memorable situations. In fact the one comment that suggested another choice, from Tele-Toby was another example of live TV - Anderson Cooper's pouring anger into his reports of Hurricane Katrina. I tend to agree and would add that much of the Hurricane Katrina coverage deserved to be included. The question is though what gets included and what doesn't. I think that for 2006 an early contender is going to be the coverage of the West Virginia coal mine disaster, if and when it is finally determined why the reporting happened the way it happened. That said, and while I do find that Kanye West's statement had a great deal of power to it, I think that Tarantino's take on CSI was one of the best things that appeared on TV in 2005. If Tarantino had done the finale of NYPD Blue - which should have been a memorable event befitting its status as one of the best TV shows of the 1990s - it would have been far better than it was.

New poll coming as soon as I figure out a topic.

You Make Me Feel Like Dancin'

Okay I admit it. I should have been watching Four Kings or The Office or My Name Is Earl for review purposes but instead I was watching the second season debut of Dancing With The Stars instead. Yes they are, at best, B-List celebrities, and some of them I've never even heard of (in the case of Kenny Mayne it doesn't help that I'm a Canadian and the only time I see ESPN is at my brother's house on Sundays), and yes I did criticize it last summer, but you know what, it is fun and It does make me feel like dancing if only because I know that I'd be better at it than P Miller. And probably Kenny Mayne.

One thing that has to be said about this season of the show is that they seem to have learned from the mistakes they made last year, the big ones and the little ones. Overall the camera work seems much better. They didn't point a camera at one of the footlights which caused the resulting glare to washed out the screen to obscure the dancers, who were after all the focus of the event. That happened a number of times in the first season, and not just in the first episode. In this first episode the only major problem occurred when one of the hand held cameras crossed in front of the field fo view of one of the studio cameras. Moreover the director seems to have gotten the message that dancing isn't something you can adequately show from the waist up. You have to see the whole body and in particular the feet. More of the shots followed Fred Astaire's rule about filming dance, that you have to see the whole body in every dance sequence.

One major problem has been eliminated with the decision to run a half hour results program on Friday rather than having teams which have already been eliminated in the previous week's voting perform again the second week. A bigger problem for me is the decision to open the phone lines for voting at the beginning of the show before any of the performances have taken place. This just seems to invite the sort of voting which happened last summer. In my mind it is probably better to open the phone lines for a specific length of time after the show has aired. Of course, since this is entertainment rather than a "real" competition - no matter what the participants may want to believe - I suppose it's acceptable. On the other hand I think the ten team formula, which led to the show expanding to two hours this week and 90 minutes next week may be more of a problem. The show didn't seem to flow as well at two hours and it did bring them into opposition with CSI. I think the show would probably do better with a smaller number of contestants - say eight - and as a result a shorter premiere episode.

Another improvement was with the hosting. Last season Tom Bergeron was initially a terrible host. He seemed to regard the whole thing as a big joke and made atrocious jokes through most of the first couple of episodes until it became clear that the show was a big hit. In this first episode he hasn't been joking nearly as much about the experience. In fact he was playing it entirely straight while maintaining a jovial manner. Last summer Bergeron's backstage co-host was former Entertainment Tonight co-host Lisa Canning. Canning isn't back this season but has been replaced by Samantha Harris of E! News. I'm not sure that the change is for the better. The backstage host's job is basically to interview celebrities which was after all Lisa Canning's job at ET and Samantha just didn't seem quite as sharp as Lisa had been.

Of course what we all want to know know is "how was the dancing." Let's just say that it ranged from spectacular to worse than Evander Holyfield ... by several orders of magnitude. Admittedly there were reasons. George Hamilton said broke four ribs falling off a yacht. Tia Carerre had a baby three months ago and is struggling with losing the weight. The best excuse of all of course goes to Master P (also listed as P Miller) who replaced his son Romeo in the competition approximately a week ago. That said he gave the single worst performance of the night. He seemed to make very little attempt to work with the music and on the whole danced the Cha Cha like a traffic cone (male celebrities did the Cha Cha - female celebrities did the Waltz). The man made Evander Holyfield from last season look like a brilliant dancer. With two exceptions the rest of the male dancers were inferior to the female celebrities. George Hamilton - he of the magnificent tan - may have been restricted in some movements by his injury (and his age - 66) which but his dancing seemed to be restricted. He was a slightly more animated traffic cone, and the difference between him and Master P - and the reason why I voted for him - was that he at least seemed to be trying. ESPN's Kenny Mayne was the second male dancer to go and he seemed to combine an inherent lack of ability with a great enthusiasm that led him to be, well silly. At one point he literally waved off a move he was supposed to do when he realize he was out of synch with his partner, Andrea Hale. At other time he made somewhat discreet waves to the audience. But again, unlike Master P he tried. The best of the male contestants were Drew Lachey and Jerry Rice. It was certainly expected that Lachey would put in an excellent performance - he was a member of the boy band 98 Degrees (along with his brother Nick of course), is currently appearing on Broadway in Rent and is married to a choreographer. He didn't disappoint as he earned the top judges marks of 24. The big surprise of the men was former 49ers wide receiver Jerry Rice. Her partner, Russian born Anna Trebunskaya seemed dubious at first. She seemed to have no real understanding of American football and in an interview stated that "real men play hockey, or soccer ... or volleyball." On the dance floor however he had a fluidity of motion as well as a strength and most importantly and enthusiasm that was exciting to see. Lachey has a leg up with his previous experience but Rice certainly has a lot of potential as this competition goes on.

The majority of the female dancers tended to be better than the men. None received a score lower than 19. That went to Soap Talk host Lisa Rinna, who made a number of slight missteps through her performance . For all that, I thought that Tia Carrere turned in a satisfactory performance. Her movements were graceful but not particularly spectacular. Spectacular came from WWE wrestler Stacy Keibler who used her previous dance training and very long legs to considerable advantage. For all that her past training might come back to haunt her if the judges expect more from her because of it. Surprises were KTLA morning news personality Giselle Fernandez whose performance was excellent in terms of fluidity, and Tatum O'Neal. Tatum was giving something of a comic performance backstage, although how much of that was the producer's idea is a good question but when it came to the dancing she was spot on.

Dancing With The Stars was an improbable ratings hit last summer. I don't expect it to draw the sort of ratings this winter that it did in the summer particularly on a Thursday night. I think that ABC made a mistake in approaching the series as anything more than cotton candy in the summer. That said I watched it, and will probably watch it again next week, because it can get addictive. Sort of like cotton candy.

Somethin's Happenin' Here

What it is ain't exactly clear.

Well actually it is (at least I think so), but first I suppose I should tell you what's happening that's enough to get me to post about it.

It's January 4 and in most years we are enduring what some people - originally Buffy and Angel fans I think, at least the first time I saw the term was in newsgroups for those two shows - call (cue reverb) Rerun Hell! that period when shows you have become very fond of and which have survived the winnowing (I like that word - it means separating the grain from the chaff) process of Nielsen and November Sweeps take a not particularly well deserved break so that they'll have enough episodes left to show during February and May Sweeps. But take a look at tonight's lineup on the six US networks. ABC has the season debut of Dancing With The Stars; NBC has new episodes of Will & Grace, ER the newly transplanted My Name Is Earl and The Office, and the debut of Four Kings; CBS has new episodes of CSI and Without A Trace; and Fox has a Rob Schneider movie The Hot Chick (which oddly enough is most an improvement over their normal lineup. Only UPN and The WB are airing reruns (well CBS has an older CSI in the Survivor time slot, but that's another story) and in the case of The WB one of the reruns is of their summer series Beauty And The Geek which is a week-long marathon before the show comes back for a second season next Thursday. The trend continues with relatively few exceptions (in one case NBC has The Golden Globes and Fox has two hours of 24 - CBS decided that would be a good Monday to run previously seen episodes) until at least January 17, which is as far as Zap2It goes. In that time you have the debuts of over ten new series including Emily's Reasons Why Not, Love Monkey, Courting Alex, Crumbs, and The Book Of Daniel, as well as the return of a number of series which have either been held back like Scrubs and Jake in Progress, or were intended for a special run, like Dancing With The Stars and 24. This is not normal. In most cases new shows would be held for February sweeps or after sweeps. Just as an example, last year Blind Justice debuted in March. So what is happening here?

The answer is that there's a 2000 lb. gorilla in the room - the kind that not only sits where it wants but doesn't apologise when it breaks stuff. Take a look at this calendar:
The dates with red backgrounds represent the gorilla - the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino. Seventeen days out of the February sweeps period when - short of repeating "Nipplegate" but letting people know it's going to happen first - NBC will win every night. Why? Because even if they think that Curling is something done to women in a hair salon and Skiing is done behind a high powered boat - and more importantly even though NBC offers coverage that can be charitably described as "crap" - Americans will watch the Winter Olympics in prime time (because of course NBC doesn't show the games live even when they're in the United States) in droves to cheer for the Red, White, and Blue.

What's a network without the Olympics to do with such a gorilla? My guess is that with a few exceptions - like 24 they'll get out of the way. I think this is why they're setting up limited run series like Beauty And The Geek, Skating With The Celebrities and Dancing With The Stars to reach a climax during those week and throwing out a few new shows, hoping they'll either build an audience and be relatively safe after the Olympics or (more likely in most cases) will crash and burn so that they can be finished off during the Games. For their regular series I think that February will see a lot of the repeats that January normally does. However the networks without the Olympics can't let NBC benefit from a post-Olympics bounce - thanks to show promotion during the Games - so they seem to have decided to run new shows in January And of course to compete NBC has to run new episodes of their shows opposite the other networks new episodes or else their ratings are hurt. At least that's how I see it

It's all a complex, fascinating, maddening game.

TV On DVD - January 3, 2006

One of my goals (I don't make resolutions) in the new year is to get these DVD articles written and online in a timely manner which I wasn't always able to do last year. It helps that this week's list is a very compact one. It is however one with considerable value for money. At least one very definite must have on this list.

Alien Nation: The Complete Series
- Alien Nation was one of the best shows that the Fox Network had in its first season (1989-90). So naturally it was cancelled after one season, thereby establishing a tradition which continues to this day at the network, although reportedly in this case the show was dropped because of a cash crunch at the network. I never saw the series when it ran initially - my local cable system didn't pick up Fox until 1995. By this time Fox had begun airing a series of made for TV movies based on the series and I only saw the actual series a number of years after that. The trouble is that even the best made for TV movie can't deliver the character development that a well thought out series is capable of delivering. While the series at first seems like "just" another cop show with a rather unique hook, it is in fact a rather cleverly delivered allegory on various forms of prejudice and bigotry. Definitely worth seeing

All in the Family: The Complete Fifth Season
- The fifth season of All in the Family features a couple fo rather unique events. The season starts with a four episode arc featuring Archie's union going out on strike, and later there's what amounts to a three episode arc in which Archie goes missing while on the way to a union convention. Along the way there's the usual friction between Archie and Mike, and Archie and the Jeffersons, who move on up to a deluxe apartment in the sky during this season (the episode "The Jeffersons Move Up" served as a pilot for The Jeffersons), with Mike and Gloria eventually renting the Jefferson house at the end of the season. At the time, one was supposed to feel sympathy for and side with Mike in his battles with Archie, but it's hard sometimes because he can be such an intellectual snob - as pointed out when Gloria feels like an outcast during this season's episode "Mike's Friend". Finally, the fifth season features a retrospective on the first five years of the series hosted by Henry Fonda.

Gunsmoke: 50th Anniversary Edition, Volume 1
Gunsmoke: 50th Anniversary Edition, Volume 2
Gunsmoke: 50th Anniversary Edition, Volumes 1 & 2
- One of the most beloved TV series - and certainly at twenty seasons one of the longest running series of any type - Gunsmoke was the great survivor of TV history. The show was cancelled in 1967 and then reborn for another eight seasons. (One story has it that it was "Babe" Paley's favourite show and she persuaded her husband Bill Paley - who was also a fan - to bring it back; Reflections In A Bloodshot Eye simply says that Paley was simply unhappy about the state of the Monday lineup and cancelled Gilligan's Island and new series to make room for it.) The series proved highly adaptable, forced to change from black & white to colour, half hour to hour formats, James Arness's health problems (Arness apparently had back problems as a result of wounds he suffered during the Anzio landing), and the anti-TV violence activism of the early 1970s. The huge number of episodes - and seasons - might explain why Paramount is releasing the series in this two volume form. As I understand it Volume One contains 17 of the half-hour black and white episodes on three discs, while Volume Two has 12 one hour colour episodes, mostly in colour. This is a mere sampling of the total 233 half-hour and 400 hour episodes produced. If you are going to buy this set, and as a fan I'm prejudiced enough to recommend it even if I think the decision not to offer it on a season basis is short sighted, I'd suggest buying the box set which contains both Volumes 1 and 2. You're going to want them both and the price is very attractive compared to buying separately.

Have Gun Will Travel Complete Third Season
- In comparison to the Gunsmoke sets, the people who own the rights to Have Gun Will Travel have decided that releasing the series on a season by season basis. It helps that there are only six seasons compared to twenty for Gunsmoke, but on the whole I think this is the approach to take. As for the series itself, Richard Boone's articulate and urbane gun for hire is one of the signature figures of the 1950s. More than most series on TV Have Gun Will Travel was very dependent on the ability of the actor to carry the lead role, and Richard Boone was ideally matched to the part.

Hunter: The Complete Third Season
- I wasn't a big enough fan of Sgt. Rick Hunter and Dee Dee "the Brass Cupcake" McCall to have really made it to the third season. On the whole it was workmanlike stuff, and my grandfather was a big fan, but it simply didn't retain my interest and there was stuff on that I preferred (for example Spenser For Hire).

Silk Stalkings: Season Four
- A USA Networks series which I don't think ever aired here, at least not on a channel I'm able to see. Basically I have no opinion on this one.

The Mystery Lady Is...

Lucille Ball, as many of you picked up on.

The photo, which is absolutely authentic - it comes from Stefan Kanfer's book Ball of Fire , dates from the early 1930s (1932 or '33 probably - my ability to check a reference was hurt by the fact that the Public Library was closed today) either during her period as a model for designer Hattie Carnegie, or her period as a Goldwyn Girl. She was about 21 at the time, and probably a blonde. Lucy started in movies (including Roman Scandal where she played a "naked" slave girl) in 1933 and she soon became known as the "Queen of the Bs" at RKO and later at MGM. She was 40 years old when I Love Lucy debuted and made two movies, The Long, Long Trailer and Forever Darling with her husband and business partner Desi Arnaz during hiatuses in the production of I Love Lucy, as well as other movies during breaks from her later series. Besides producing both I Love Lucy and the later Lucy Show (the first season of which was produced by Desi), Desilu Studios produced such series as December Bride, The Untouchables, Star Trek, Mission Impossible, and Mannix. When Desi Arnaz sold his interest in the studio to Lucy she became the first woman to head a major Hollywood studio.

As for those of people who described seeing this photo as being "like seeing your grandma naked when she was young" (as Sam Johnson put it) consider that a woman of 20 who posed in Playboy in 1960 would be 65 years of age and probably has grandchildren between 15 and 20. The difference is that Lucy was in the public eye a lot more - and a lot longer - than virtually any woman who has been a Playboy centerfold. More over most of us became aware of her when she was at an age when most women her age would have been grandmothers. And if you really want to be grossed out, consider that Shirley Jones, at nearly 72, has a bedroom scene in the new Adam Sandler movie Grandma's Boy. Now that's an EWWW moment.

A New Year's Photo Quiz

The woman in this photo would become one of the most famous figures in television some years after this picture was taken. Getting her start in movies she moved into TV in her late 30s, but would continue to make movies during breaks from her series. With her partner she formed her own successful production company which not only produced her own show but several others. Who is she? (Please answer in the comments section or by email.) I'll give the answer on Tuesday.

P.S. There are no prizes just the satisfaction of being right or the indignity of being wrong.

New Poll (Finally) - What Was The Big TV Moment in Calendar 2005?

In this case a "moment" can be an incident in a show, an episode of a show, or a show itself...but mostly the first two. I'm going to offer an observation and suggest that "moments" tend to occur most in live situations, and in non-scripted but edited shows (reality shows). I mean sure, series give us cliffhangers but when it comes right down to it we know that whatever catastrophic event happens at the end of the season, the writers are going to make sure that most if not all of the results will, on the whole be superficial changes at best. So with that as a base, here's what I've got.

Final episode of The Amazing Race 7 - Uchenna & Joyce come from having no money and being last to beat Rob & Amber. Their victory is made possible when a jetway that has been retracted is extended again to allow Uchenna & Joyce to get on the same plane as Rob & Amber.

Tarantino directed episode of CSI - Yes I know this goes against everything I said above, but this was one of the most talked about episodes of any TV series of the year. It's also one of the few episodes of any series that I know of which has been offered as a stand-alone DVD.

ABC's memorial to Peter Jennings - A two hour event that was offered commercial free and was an amazing study of Jennings's life and dedication to quality in journalism. One of the best biographies of a TV personality although the dedication to quality in journalism it represented was undercut by the fact that ABC's News Division was running an ongoing series about online dating that was more fitting as a reality series for the Entertainment Division.

Kanye West on the NBC Katrina benefit show - "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

Randal tells Trump he should not also hire Rebecca on The Apprentice - Given the way the two had interacted over the previous weeks and just how close the final task really was, Randal's statement and his attitude was a real shock, particularly if you really accept that the show is a job interview rather than just a game. That is to say that if he's serious about being Trump's employee he should be willing to advise him to hire a qualified person that the boss is interested in. Instead he couched his response in terms that were related to the show.

Tom Cruise on Oprah and The Today Show - The destruction of the star's reputation will be televised.

Feel free to comment and add more options here.

Guilty Pleasures - A Meme

Sam had this meme on Sam-a-rama and after he listed the people he wanted to respond he opened it up to his entire blogroll so I'm taking the challenge and I'll even add one at the end.

Guiltiest Song: This is hard for me. I don't listen to much popular music - I listen to CBC Radio 2 for heaven's sake which is pretty much all classical, and I have a great fondness for big bands. I mean it was on Radio 2 that I discovered The Blind Boys of Alabama's tremendous version of "Amazing Grace" done to the tune of "House Of The Rising Sun", but that can hardly be a guilty pleasure. I could mention "Nessun Dorma" as done (to death) by Pavarotti for his encore piece, but when it comes to a really guilty pleasure I have to go with a classic, not classical. It is none other than Elvis Presley singing "Viva Las Vegas".

Guiltiest TV: Is it a guilty pleasure when you tell everyone you meet to watch a particular show? If so then my guilty pleasure is and has been for a while The Amazing Race. I just got my season 1 DVD set which totally makes up for a frustrating week of getting to places where they had the Firefly set on sale... but were sold out. Well almost. I honestly believe that its the best of the realitycompetition shows, which is what makes it painful when they produce a poor season like the Family Edition. Fortunately the real Amazing Race is back this spring, starting in late February or early March.

Guiltiest Food: Sushi from Sobeys. I mean really, a sushi snob (someone who knows the difference between the various qualities of tuna), or even someone who likes to go to a restaurant and get some nigiri or maki from time to time would turn their nose up at this stuff but I just love it, mainly because I can usually get it for Sunday lunch with little difficulty. I usually alternate between the mixed combo and the smoked Salmon. How great is my devotion? I learned to use chopsticks so I could eat it properly.

Guiliest Drink: Forgot this when I originally posted. I rarely drink alcohol (an occassional glass of wine, preferablly white because I usually have a reaction to some components in red wines) , and I also don't drink coffee or tea (neve acquired the taste). What I do drink whenever I get the chance is a Double Gulp Dr. Pepper from 7-11. I used to survive on these until they shut down (and then bulldozed) the neighbourhood 7-11 almost a year ago.

Guiltiest Crush: I don't know how you can have a guilty crush. What makes a crush guilty? Inaccessibility? Some other quality that makes them forbidden fruit? I mean I've mentioned my erotic dreams about Martha Stewart and about Donald Trump's associate Caroline Keptcher, but if you really want to talk inaccessible how about Batgirl and/or Supergirl. Yeah I'm talking about the ones in the comic books, not Dinah Meyer (although I wouldn't kick her out of bed for eating crackers) or Helen Slater (ditto), but the comic book versions were hot. But when it comes to crushes I guess I have to say Emily Procter, who plays Calleigh Duquesne on CSI: Miami. I enjoyed her and sort of had a crush on her on those episodes of West Wing that she did, and I did in fact see that scene in the TV movie Breast Men (and I can safely say that David Schwimmer is a lucky bastich for being in that scene) but it's Calleigh that really does it for me. There's one scene in the current season that sums it up for me. Calleigh has just retaken the ballistics lab from the slacker who was hired to replace her (after she quit because her ex-lover blew his brains out in front of her in that room) and she's test firing a pistol; when she finishes her two shots she breaks into the single most beautiful smile I've ever seen. I'm in love!

Guiltiest Man Crush: I mean I don't swing this way but if there is one man that I find particularly hot in that sort of way it is none other than Mr. Allyson Hannigan, aka Alexis Denisof. Now everyone knows him as Wesley from Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel, but I first became aware of him when he played the villainous Lord Rossendale in the last three episode of the Sharpe series. Rossendale is a cad and a bounder as well as a coward, but looking at a picture like this, one can readily understand why Sharpe's half-witted wife dropped her knickers at the merest indication that he would consider such a creature as she (but of course he was interested in her - she had all of Sharpe's not inconsiderable fortune).

Guiltiest New Fad: I'm addicted to doing Sudokus. I wish someone had bought me a book of them

Poll Results - What Was The Best New Show Of Calendar 2005?

A fairly good response for this question although I honestly thought that the results would be spread out a little more. There were fifteen votes cast. Numb3rs, Commander In Chief, and Everybody Hates Chris all tied for fourth place with no votes. The Office, which debuted last spring came in third with three votes or 20%. In second place with five votes (33%) was My Name Is Earl. The winner, although without a majority of the support was Prison Break with seven votes (46%). ( One note about a show that wasn't included. While Doctor Who debuted in Canada in 2005, it isn't widely available to our friends to the south. As a result I didn't include it although I at least think it was probably at least as good as most of the shows that I listed.)

What I was expecting: I had thought that, because of their ratings, Numb3rs and Commander In Chief, might get at lest one vote. Numb3rs has been a major success in terms of ratings, knocking off two highly regarded NBC series, while I suspect that Commander In Chief has benefitted from the rather lackluster Family Edition of The Amazing Race. How it will do against real opposition from other programs including a more traditional season of The Amazing Race is another matter. What did surprise me was that Everybody Hates Chris got no support. The series has been well supported by "real" critics (that is to say the guys who get paid to review TV shows), and has done well in the ratings, at least well for a UPN show. Maybe this represents a prejudice against UPN shows from my readership.

This brings us to the three vote getters I expected these three series to get the lion's share of the vote. It's representative of something important that NBC is using The Office and My Name Is Earl as a significant part of their strategy to try to salvage something out of their "Must See TV" Thursday lineup and weakening their position on Tuesday nights as a result. I haven't reviewed them yet but these two shows have a significant draw to them and are successfully pushing a different notion of what a situation comedy can be. I have watched Prison Break, and even given it a favourable review. The only problem is that I haven't stuck with the show after the first few episodes - it was on Monday nights which is a problem for me, and while I will make an effort for a show I'm addicted to - like 24 - Prison Break hasn't really gained any traction with me because I haven't been able to see every episode. It may indeed have had - as one voter commented - "plot holes you could drive a truck through" but the show is compelling enough to encourage willing suspension of disbelief, and this can't help but be a good thing.

New poll up shortly.

The Latest Doctor

I had meant to post something earlier, either late yesterday or sometime earlier today, but in truth it is amazing what one drumstick of Tryptophan and a 3 year old nephew can do to me. Christmas night I had to wake up from my nap to go to bed. Monday I woke up too tired to go Boxing Day shopping even if that didn't mean standing overnight in front of some store to get the best possible bargain - I did that once and once was more than enough.

Television on Christmas, and for most of the week before and after, is pretty dire stuff mostly made up of reruns, made for TV movies and more reruns. Even sports were pretty weak. The NHL doesn't play on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day - never has - and the NFL moved all of its Sunday games to Saturday so as not to play on Christmas - which may be something new. There was probably a Bowl game of some sort (actually no, there wasn't), but the only pro league to be playing was the NBA, which had two game (I suppose I could wonder if this is some sort of commentary on the family values of the league or its players union but frankly I'm not that interested). About the biggest thing on TV on Monday was the last "episode" of ABC's Monday Night Football. This is of course one of the many differences between North America and Britain. While we become comatose from overingesting turkey and don't notice the raft of reruns on Christmas, the British eat goose - well except for the Scots who save their feasting for Hogmanay - and watch TV - usually special episodes of shows, some of which have long since vanished from the air except at Christmas. Of course the one special that was most awaited - on both sides of the Atlantic - was Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion if only because it was the first real appearance of the new Doctor, David Tennant. The show aired on Christmas evening in Britain and on Boxing Day evening in Canada and all I can say is that while I miss Christopher Ecclestone a lot, David Tennant really isn't bad at all, given just how much - or rather how little - we actually saw if him.

The episode actually starts on Earth, with Rose Tyler's mother Jackie decorating a tacky white artificial Christmas tree and looking wistfully at a Christmas package she has prepared for her daughter. The scene then cuts to Rose's old boyfriend Mickey as he's working at a garage. Suddenly both hear a familiar - to them - sound: the TARDIS. However, unlike most appearances of the time ship this time the old blue police box is falling out of control crashing into things before finally landing in the courtyard of the housing estate where Jackie and Mickey live. The doors open and from them emerges an unknown figure. He rushes around confused but knowing who they are. He finally says "Merry Christmas" and collapses. Rose comes out shortly there after and when her mom asks where The Doctor is she is informed that this is him to which Jackie responds "What do you mean that's the Doctor? Doctor Who?" At which point the theme starts.

I wanted to emphasize this because you really don't see much of The Doctor in this episode. According to the TV listings the episode was supposed to last 90 minutes but the actual running time was closer to 75 or 80 minutes with commercials which means that the show itself ran about 60 minutes without commercials. Of that Tennant's version of The Doctor was only active on screen for what seemed like 15 or 20 minutes. For the rest of the time the focus was on Rose Mickey and Jackie, and on Harriet Jones, Prime Minister. This emphasis on the human characters seems a bit odd. In the case of the Rose storylne it is in keeping with the series' concept in which Rose is less of a screaming sidekick and more of a heroic figure on her own. In this case though she is made painfully aware of just how dependent she is on The Doctor. When she, Jackie and Mickey are attacked by various Christmas related menaces (a quartet of musical Santa Clauses whose instruments double as weapons, and a whirling Christmas tree) she's forced to revive The Doctor long enough to defeat the initial menace - in this brief conscious moment he describes them as "pilot fish"; scavengers picking around a greater threat. This however disrupts his regeneration, to the point where one heart stops and he seems near death again. This has the side effect of stripping her of the ability to understand any language spoken, which is granted to her by the TARDIS. It's something that brings home not only how dependent she is on The Doctor but also how used she has become to being with him and to the adventure of being his companion. She loves it, and Mickey at least understands just how addicted she is to it, even though he doesn't like it.

The main crisis faces Harriet Jones as Britain's Prime Minister. As part of the "new Golden Age" Britain has launched a Mars probe - Guinevere I - which is due to land on Mars on Christmas Day. In fact the probe is intercepted by an alien space ship headed for Earth. The aliens, who we shortly learn are called the Sycorax, are claiming Earth - and its inhabitants - for their own. Jones is forced to choose to surrender Earth or else "They will die." As it turns out they are the roughly one third of the Earth's population who have A+ blood (this figure is totally accurate by the way; 34% of the population of earth has A+ blood). Every person with A+ blood goes to the highest building they can find and stand on the edge (this includes the Queen and the entire Royal Family) In desperation Harriet goes on television asking for the help of The Doctor, if he's on Earth. The Sycorax bring her and several of her advisors up to their ship where they kill the designer of the Guinevere probe and Harriet's UNIT advisor. They lose interest in Harriet however when they detect an energy source from Earth - the TARDIS, with Rose, Mickey, and an unconscious Doctor aboard. Rose and Mickey are captured, but some spilled tea helps to revive The Doctor, something which Rose realizes when she suddenly starts to understand the words of the Sycorax leader. Once he steps out of the TARDIS, he makes short work of the Sycorax plot (it turns out that they're using something akin to hypnosis as a bluff) and rapidly defeats the Sycorax leader in single combat. He tells the remaining Sycorax to leave Earth and to never return, and to tell any other races they encounter that Earth is defended. They don't get a chance - Harriet Jones uses an adapted alien weapon to destroy the Sycorax ship, angering The Doctor immensely. Harriet's logic for committing what The Doctor calls murder is compelling - the Earth survived this time only because The Doctor just happened to be on Earth this time - but he regards humanity as the real monsters, and he does take action against Harriet personally.

The episode has a nice fun feeling to it even without The Doctor being present as much as he normally is. He shows up and saves the day with incredible ease. The Sycorax as a menace are the sort that he can defeat. They seem to be a gentler version of the aliens from Independence Day travelling the galaxy looting what they can but I had the distinct feeling that they were more like interplanetary conmen, trying to convince the unsophisticated yokels that they have magic available to them. The Sycorax are defeated easily because they're an insignificant menace - to him. In fact he literally defeats them wearing a pair of pyjamas. It serves well in its role as an introduction for Tennant. On the whole he isn't bad, although at times his accent, enunciation and the speed with which speak can on occasion be hard to understand. Of course I at least initially said that about Eccleston as well. As an actor he's an interesting physical type, and once we see him more extensively in the role we'll probably become more comfortable with him in the part. Mostly though this is an episode isn't really about introducing us to Tennant and more about how humans interact with the Doctor and the degree to which his relations with them have an effect on their actions.

(I should mention Torchwood. We have the impression that Torchwood is the name of the weapon itself, but apparently it's something more. It is in fact a spin-off of Doctor Who - the name is an anagram - which will feature John Barrowman as Captain Jack Harkness and will debut on the BBC in the autumn of 2006.)

Merry Christmas!

I had planned something far grander than this, but circumstances intervened (I fell asleep).

To all of you friends and gentle readers (two groups which with relatively few exceptions are not mutually exclusive) I wish as Merry a Christmas as this Child of TV had when this photo was taken and the best of this Festive Season whatever tradition and beliefs you might follow.

Dear Martha:

You really got the fuzzy end of the lollypop on this whole Apprentice thing didn't you dear. They come to you and ask you to do it and then things just sort of fell apart. First they give you a crappy time slot on Wednesday night and then when you don't perform immediately they move your show to an even suckier time slot so that Jerry Bruckheimer doesn't get irritated. (I was going to say pissed, but you are Martha Stewart - even when you were in prison people didn't use words like that around you.) I mean people actually watch Lost - his silly E-Ring wasn't going to beat that.

Oh but that was all was it Martha. There were the candidates. Trump got people like Randal, Rebecca, Felisha and Alla - okay Alla's a bad example; she would use words like pissed around you - and you got Dawna, Bethanny, Howie and nutso Jim. I mean darling I know you're Martha Stewart but even you can't make silk purses out of those sow's ears, anymore than you could make Charles and Alexa into George and Caroline. (Oh by the way Martha, I hate to tell you this - I've had more erotic dreams about Caroline than I've had about you, and I'm even counting the one with you and Alexa together, which I know is something you don't like to talk about). I mean sure Donald got saddled with Markus and the virgin Adam but you had Jeff, Jennifer and Chuck. Too much dear.

But of course it didn't stop there did it. There were other indignities. First Donald Trump shows up on your show, all sweetness and light, talking about how he's your friend and all that. Then when his ratings started to tank he doesn't blame NBC for their deteriorating Thursday night lineup or Jerry Bruckheimer for CSI being good this year, or the other networks for being like the crocodiles on Survivor: Guatemala in search of a vulnerable target. No Martha, he blamed you. Said you diluted the brand or some such bullsh....sorry Martha.... Bovine Scatology. So I suppose it's no wonder that the network weasels over at NBC - the guys who had been so welcoming to you when you got out of the Big House (no not your place in Maine; I'm talking about prison dear) - turned around and cancelled your show. Where is the love there?

Ah but the finale, the finale was where the final digs came in. Trump got a battle for the ages between Randal and Rebecca, and you got, well you got Dawna and Bethanny. I mean talk about white bread; and factory made white bread at that, not the stuff you (or rather your assistants) hand make yourself. They give Trump two hours to wrap things up while you get an hour between a game show for people too dumb to play Scrabble - oh sorry I forgot, wasn't it Dawna who had no idea how to play Scrabble - and a repeat of Law & Order four days before Christmas when no one is watching TV. I mean set aside the fact that it takes you an hour to wrap one Christmas present (what with making the wrapping paper, the ribbons, and those perfect name tags), just giving you an hour is a bit of an insult. And Trump gets Lincoln Center and a crowd of thousands while you get your daily show studio and a crowd of hundreds, well dozens anyway. So sad.

Now I have to confess I didn't watch all of the last episode. There was a particularly gripping episode of Call For Help on at the same time and I kept switching back and forth, so I missed the defense each of the candidates gave for their events, which as far as I could tell went off like clockwork. That may have been a problem. I mean remember all of the "sturm und drang" that Trump's show got out of things falling apart for Randal and Rebecca. Things falling to pieces and being "rescued" - or not - at the last moment is the stuff of drama. The best your ladies could come up was all the corrections that had to be made to the Liz Claiborne program, and that was well-defended. So no, Martha you weren't exactly up there on the drama part.

And then of course there was the live conference room. Let's just say that you made the safe choice, and of course the obviously correct choice. You need a team player and the very fact that Bethanny had to pick someone who hated her like Carrie or whoever it was did spoke volumes about her as a team player throughout the process. Even nutso Jim commented on that one and let's admit that he's pretty observant when it comes to gaps in other people's armour - ones he can use at least. (By the way Martha, if you and Donald Trump are still on speaking terms you might want to recommend nutso Jim to him, either as a candidate for Apprentice or for Court Jester. The guy is a funny Macchiavellian although he'd probably be insulted by the funny part of the description. Anyway, someone far more suited to working fro Trump than you.) You were left with the nice safe choice of Dawna, someone who doesn't make waves and can be left to submerge herself in whatever project you assigned her. Which turned out to be a position as Director of Development in one of your magazines based out of Boston. Is it really called Body & Soul? Apparently you are far less imaginative than I give you credit for in my erotic dreams. No matter, it's a good fit for her, and you even gave her a Buick Lucerne to escape from New York during the transit strike. Best of all you didn't put her on the hot seat by asking her if you should hire Bethenny too - that's not your style. Unfortunately the whole thing seemed anticlimactic (and no that's not a reference to erotic dreams) which made it seem, well... boring.

So dear Martha, this phase in your life has ended. I wish you good luck in your future endeavours but sadly in this circumstance you simply didn't fit in.

Deal Or No Deal - The Online Game

Last night I took a rip at Deal or No Deal as being a boring idea for a game show. I still think I'm right, but Mark Evanier doesn't agree. He likes it, in fact he likes it so much that he wrote not one but two posts about it. I still think I'm right, but it's a case of horses for courses and for him it's an enjoyable way to waste an hour.

However since I wasn't interested in the show enough to check out its website (and I rarely am by the way) it took a mention from Mark to get me to find out about the Deal Or No Deal online game, which is a rather interesting way to spend a few minutes. You can't win anything - that's left to their phone in thing that runs during each episode and seems about as interesting as watching paint dry - but you can take part in the sort of decision making that the players have to go through. As I expected there is no real optimal strategy for picking cases - picking 1-2-3-4-5 seems to work as well as randomization. The big question is when is the right time to make your deal. Unless you've had a truly atrocious run of luck you shouldn't make a deal before you get to the level of picking one case at a time. At the same time, unless the choice is between two extremely high amounts of money you should make a deal at some point in play - in other words don't open all of the suitcases. Beyond that, your strategy depends on perceived odds of winning. Try it yourself.

The Game Show For Dummies

According to the introductory narration for the NBC weak long "event" Deal Or No Deal, the show is a "hit" in over 35 countries. It seems obvious to me that these are countries that have yet to discover the thrills ofJeopardy or Wheel Of Fortune. In fact they probably haven't seen Family Feud yet. Frankly I found this show to be boring with a capital bore.

Deal Or No Deal seems to be a cross between Hide And Seek and "pick a number between 1 and 10". There are 26 numbered briefcases (the fancy metal kind) held by a racially diverse group of attractive young women. Each briefcase holds a sum of money ranging between 1 cent and $1,000,000. Well not really - it holds a card that states an amount between 1 cent and $1,000,000 which I think is missing a bet but more on that later. The player picks one briefcase as his or her own. Then the game begins. The player tells host Howie Mandel the numbers of six of the remaining briefcases which are then opened to reveal an amount of money. That amount of money is then removed from the possible amounts that could be in the briefcase. After six cases are opened the "Banker" calls down to Mandel with an offer. This is the amount of money the bank will pay the player based on the possible amounts of money that could be in the briefcase. If that offer is rejected the player names five numbers before a new offer is made, and so on with the number of briefcases picked being reduced by one each time until the player is left to pick one case at a time. The greater the number of high denomination cases remaining the greater the offer made by the bank. Just as an example if three cases remain with values of $10,000, $300,000 and $400,000 (as happened in tonight's episode) the Bank might offer $189,000. If you were to substitute $100,000 for $10,000 the Bank's offer would be higher while if the $300,000 amount were $30,000 instead, the offer would be substantially lower.

There is a certain, minimal amount of strategy involved. Obviously there's no way in which the selection of briefcases can be anything but random, therefore strategy really emerges when it comes to choosing at time to give up hoping for the "two in the bush" and take the "bird in the hand" - that is to say when to stop picking briefcases and take the banker's offer. It's an odds question worthy of a poker player. In the situation I mentioned above, the odds were two to one against that the player had the $10,000 card in his briefcase but those odds were grater than they had been before the last pick which had eliminated a $400,000 case (but the offer was better as well). He took the offer and was right - his case had the $10,000 card but even if he hadn't taken the offer the next bank offer, when it would be even money that what was in his case would be $10,000 his offer would have been lower, but still significantly higher than the minimum amount he could have made. Just from casual observation it would seem that the optimal strategy if you have a large number of high value cards remaining and a small number of low value cards left is to continue playing, while the correct strategy with significantly more low than high value cards - say eight cases under $100,000 and two cases above it - would be to take what you can get rather than risk losing your high value cases thereby lowering your offer from the Banker.

The problem is that I don't think that any of the contestants who are playing this thing has any idea of an optimal strategy. Of the two contestants I saw on Tuesday night, one was a carpenter who didn't like to say the "F" word - which in this case was fiancee, referring to his girlfriend - and invited his bartender to be one of his supporters on the show on the grounds that getting him some TV time would mean free drinks. And he was the smart one! The other contestant was supposedly a teacher who seemed all giggly and called one of the models her friend who she didn't even know but shared her name. Lord give me the strength to not watch this again.

The show is hosted by Howie Mandel. Now I liked Howie Mandel when he was on St. Elsewhere. Despite being a comedian (allegedly) he seemed like might actually have some ability as a dramatic actor. I won't say he was one of the best things about St. Elsewhere but he was far from the worst. Unfortunately he never followed up on acting and devoted his life to such things as sticking a rubber glove over is head until he blew out his sinuses. If you're in Canada what you've mostly seen Howie in of late is a bunch of commercials for Boston Pizza (a chain of restaurants which as far as I can ell has nothing to do with Boston). If you've seen those commercials you'll be happy to know that Howie has taken a couple of downers and is vaguely behaving like a calm human being he's about a 1 on a scale where 0 is normal and negative numbers denote needing pep pills. But please don't get me started on the soul patch beard. A man of his age - which is to say about 9 months older than I am - shouldn't look like that.

The truth is though that any problems I have with Howie Mandel are minor compared with the problems that this show has forced upon itself. At the top of this article I mentioned that Deal Or No Deal is supposed to be a hit in 35 over countries none of which have discovered the thrills of Jeopardy. The producers are proud of the lack of intellectual stimulation in this show. At the start of each episode they state that there are "no crazy stunts, no trivia questions." The problem is that I like a show in which the contestants are challenged to do more than think of a number between 1 and 26. Whether that's eating gross food - as in Fear Factor (and believe me I never thought I say that Fear Factor was significantly better than another show) - or answering a trivia question, I want something more. I want my winners to work for their prize, to achieve it, and - not to put too fine a point on it - earn their prizes. That's one reason why I like The Amazing Race. Those people have to accomplish a great deal in order to win a million dollars while the people on Deal Or No Deal don't. And frankly, when you're used to something better, a game show for dummies just isn't enough. Avoid this like the plague.