• Let the countdown to funny begin, Conan premieres November 8th at 11PM on TBS. (See Above)
• Tina Fey MAD about MEN, books John Slattery for a guest spot.
• Want an ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT movie? You’d better watch RUNNING WILDE!
• Career Trajectory Alert! Lara Flynn Boyle in talks to get her own reality TV series.
• Tune in reminder, CAPRICA returns tonight on Syfy at 10PM (Space in Canada).
• Holy Smurf! Michael Ausiello exits Entertainment Weekly for his own Television Site.
Search Results for: pilot
We Cast the CW’s Newest Series
This just in: the CW is thisclose to picking up DANNI LOWINSKI for midseason. Based on the German series of the same name, LOWINSKI revolves around a scrappy hairdresser/law student, who after being brushed off by potential employers decides to set up her own practice in a shopping mall kiosk. According to Deadline Hollywood, “feelers have already been sent out to talent agencies for the lead character whose casting is considered key to the project.” According to us, LIFE UNEXPECTED fans should be afraid, very afraid.
A Candid Conversation with NIKITA Star Maggie Q
If anyone should be in a good mood first thing in the AM on a Monday morning, it’s actress Maggie Q. After-all, as one of the breakout stars on one of the Fall’s most buzzed about new shows, the NIKITA actress has an awful lot to be happy about at the moment. Which is probably why we had such a blast chatting with the actress, who was only too happy to dish about what attracted her to the iconic series, what it’s like facing off against Shane West, and most importantly, what’s in store for fans of the roller coaster ride that is NIKITA.
Just how much thought goes into your first television series that could potentially last for six or seven years?
Maggie Q: Weirdly, I like to make rash decisions! It’s funny, the initial meeting with the head of Warner Bros., Danny Cannon and one of the show’s creators Craig Silverstein, the plan for the character, the future of the character and the elements they were going to involve to make this good all felt really right. I guess you can sort of wonder, hope, if it’s going to feel the same way in 3 or 4 years but you certainly have to feel it initially, and I did. It all kind of fell together the way that it should. I was offered it and signed to do it within a week, everything happened so quickly.
Random Musings: LONE STAR, MIKE & MOLLY, HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER, & More!
Shame on Twitter! In response to an interesting conversation that popped up amongst the TV Twitterrati that we happen to follow, this TV Addict now finds himself doing something we never in a million years thought we’d be forced to do: Come to the defense of both Charlie Sheen and NBC. Sadly, LONE STAR’s dismal ratings have absolutely nothing to do with the popularity of time-slot competitors TWO AND A HALF MEN and THE EVENT. Rather, there is a far more insidious enemy at work here, one that fans of both quality scripted drama and comedy need to band together to defeat. That enemy: ABC’s DANCING WITH THE STAR, who inexplicably continues to attract an astounding forty-million eyeballs (or twenty-million viewers) per week.
And on a somewhat related note as we wait with bated breath for Fox’s proverbial powers that be to reach a conclusion with regards to LONE STAR’s fate, consider the following: Actor Jon Voight’s daughter on the show is played by Adrianne Palicki while his real life offspring is Angelina Jolie. Greatest genes in the world both in front and behind the camera? Discuss.
Today’s TV Addict Top 5: Questions with RUNNING WILDE Star Keri Russell
With FELICITY being off the air for nearly a decade now, what was the impetus for your return to television?
Keri Russell: Because I had such a great run with FELICITY, which was such a positive experience in every way, I certainly wasn’t shopping around to do a series again. But when I read the RUNNING WILDE pilot — being a huge ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT fan — I just was so taken by Mitch Hurwitz that I couldn’t pass it up and couldn’t say no. I think Mitch’s relationship has been with FOX before, so it was a good fit and it’s just been a delight. It’s hilarious. I feel like I’m hanging out with my older brother and all his cool friends or something and I’m just tagging along every day.
Coming from FELICITY and film, what has it been like flexing your comedic muscles?
This show is unlike anything I’ve really done before, it’s such a different ride and I feel like I’m learning so much every day. With Mitch, it’s fast and furious where he’s rewriting things seconds before we shoot them. And I’m not talking a line, I’m talking pages of rewrites where he says, “Go ahead… I’ll just stand off to the side and I’ll give you your line.” I say, “Mitch, that’s not how it works,” but by-the-way, for Will [Arnett] it is. Will is just so sharp like that and they have such a quick, I don’t know, just such a … relationship that they just know each other’s jokes. So yes, it’s working completely different muscles. But I just have to say it’s a delight and I’m enjoying it so much. Plus, I’m getting to work in New York, which is wonderful, where I live. They’re super smart, they’re funny and it’s just refreshing for me. It’s an absolute change of pace and I’m just laughing all day.
Review: THE GOOD WIFE Season 2
Bless THE GOOD WIFE. Last season’s most pleasant surprise returns to put more cerebral goodness into a powerful courtroom drama. In a fall season as tepid as this (it’s sad when MY GENERATION, mediocre by all standards, is the most ambitious of the new fall series), I welcome WIFE’s finely-calibrated approach to the procedural and serial: Poppable as any CBS drama, it rewards returning viewers with a rich, sexy narrative that’s part-thriller, part-soap opera. In the struggle to attract viewers weary of complicated season-long story lines (ahem, Lost), it’s the program of choice: keep up with the story or not, it’s compelling either way.
None of this would be possible without the perfectly-controlled and commanding Julianna Marguiles, who plays the forever-conflicted Alicia Florrick, spouse of a scandalized public figure (in the vein of Eliot Spitzer and Mark Sanford) who returns to work as a lawyer. She arguably has less dialogue than some of the supporting characters — she doesn’t need it, she conveys Alicia’s constantly turning mind with just a peer of her eyes. Her husband Peter (Chris Noth) is fresh out of jail and back on the campaign circuit for district attorney, reopening and creating wounds of their already rocky marriage.
Work is getting trickier too: The firm where Alicia works has just merged with another from D.C., and the motives of her new boss (played by SLEEPER CELL’s Michael Ealy) already smell fishy. Her other boss, Will (Josh Charles), whom Alicia began to rekindle an old college lust with during her husband’s time away, ended last season with a pleading phone conversation as Alicia is being called to the podium to stand next to her husband. She’s always so torn: which man to choose, how to explain their family’s public upheaval to her kids, the best way to proceed in a precarious case, whether to screw over a colleague to get ahead — there’s a grace to all of it, never inciting our impatience.
Season 2 gets us back into the courtroom, where THE GOOD WIFE doesn’t falter: yes, they’re easy (poppable, remember?), but they’re executed with classic LAW & ORDER-like precision and tension — the cast just sparks during trial, which the show presents as this realm of heightened-reality where the stakes seem convincingly dire. More of the enigmatic in-house investigator Kalinda (Emmy winner Archie Panjabi) as well, who now has a rival (and love interest?) in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS’ Scott Porter as a fellow investigator brought in with the new firm. Where it truly shines in its weekly cases is the rolodex of actors they cast as judges (Denis O’Hare, Russell Edgington himself, has made two great appearances thus far), who bring an element of uncertainty to each with their own idiosyncrasies, and nicely reflects how the nature of a case can be tempered by the judge’s mood.
This season is setting itself up to be even more political, or as it reads better in TV, topical. This can be as precarious as a period show: the temptation to be on-the-nose is almost too seductive to turn down, THE GOOD WIFE included in the guilty party (there is something creepy to Alan Cumming saying “tweet”), but it cheekily plays up the liberal and feminist ideologies of firm partner Diane (the transformative, always-game Christine Baranski) with a wink.
In the end though, it’s always Julianna Marguiles. She is THE GOOD WIFE, her performance of such a caliber that it’d be impossible to execute as well as it is without her. The show reliably rises to meet her bravura performance, making only rare missteps in its otherwise solid progression as a buzzed-about ratings hit. Grade: A-
THE GOOD WIFE returns Tuesday, Sept. 28 at 10PM (EST) on CBS (Global in Canada)
Aleks Chan is a contributing writer to The TV Addict. He has seen every episode of BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER four times, has once referred to his DVR as his “best friend,” and has only seen the pilot episode of THE SOPRANOS — and has no intention to apologize for it. He lives in Austin, Texas. His name is pronounced like Alex. Email him at alekschan.thetvaddict@gmail.com, follow him on Twitter (@alekstvaddict), or his own blog, Screen Reader.
Must Read TV: LONESTAR, TEAM COCO, USA Network & More!
• USA FTW! Renews WHITE COLLAR, ROYAL PAINS and PSYCH.
• No longer in EVERWOOD, Treat Williams signs onto a new Lifetime police procedural AGAINST THE WALL.
• Good News: DVR numbers boosts ratings for new show. Bad News: With the exception of LONE STAR.
• Not on Team Coco: Max Weinberg, who announces his departure from Conan O’Brien’s new show.
• Holy $#*! Another twitter feed gets a CBS comedy deal.
Today’s TV Addict Top 5: Burning Questions with the Mastermind Behind THE EVENT
We promised ourselves we wouldn’t let this happen again. Yet one week after NBC premiered THE EVENT here we are, against our better judgment, HOOKED, on yet another serialized drama! And a big part of that reason why is show creator — and more than likely one of the only men on the planet who actually knows what on earth is going on — Nick Wauters. We caught up with the talented showrunner last week, when he was kind enough to take some time to submit to a few nosy questions from us reporter-types via conference call.
One of the criticisms pertaining to last week’s series premiere was that it seemed very heavy on the plot side and somewhat lacking in character development department. Are there any plans in the future to sort of pull a “LOST” and focus more on characters or are you just going to keep pushing forward with plot for the foreseeable future?
Nick Wauters: Our show needs a certain amount of energy and mystery to keep the audience captivated, but I also think characters are everything. And even though there wasn’t a lot of room for character development in the pilot, I have spent a lot of time creating these characters, developing them and imaging who they are. So in the future, fans can expect more exploration of each character, probably in a similar fashion that LOST did where an episode will focus on specific character.
Channel Surfing: DEXTER, FAMILY GUY, DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES & More!
How does a man who has never been able to emotionally connect with anyone or anything deal with the brutal death of the one person who came closest to bringing out his humanity? And how is his seeming lack of humanity viewed by those around him, including the sister who has long struggled to understand his quirks? That was the intriguing premise behind the fifth-season premiere of DEXTER as our anti-hero struggled with the aftermath of wife Rita’s murder. Having Dexter’s disconnect from humanity be the very thing that makes him look like a prime suspect in Rita’s death was a stroke of genius, and the scene in which he broke news of her death to his stepchildren while wearing a pair of mouse ears from Disney World – aka the Happiest Place On Earth – beautifully displayed exactly the kind of dichotomy this series has specialized in from the beginning. If there was one flaw with the episode, it lay not in what transpired during the hour but in the spoiler-heavy preview of what’s to come this season. That said, having not flicked the TV off quickly enough to avoid seeing them, it looks as if we’re in for a hell of a ride over the next 13-weeks.
If last night’s FAMILY GUY is a sign of what to expect this weekend, we’re in for some good stuff. While the episode wasn’t as laugh-packed as usual, it was an epic homage to every flick from And Then There Were None to Clue, all done with a directorial flair that showcased the limitless nature of animation. It’ll be interesting to see if the episode’s deaths — especially those of Mort’s wife and newswoman Diane Simmons — are mined for future plotlines. Perhaps Marge as Tom Tucker’s new on-air sparring partner, or Mort’s search for a new wife? Of course, this being FAMILY GUY, the whole thing could wind up being explained in passing as someone’s dream. One thing’s for sure: I can’t wait until next week, when Brian takes on Rush Limbaugh! Talk about a dog-eat-dog scenario!
To say I haven’t been a huge fan of DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES over the past few seasons would be an understatement on par with John McCain is no spring chicken. But I’ll admit that last night’s episode — the seventh-season premiere — was better than pretty much any of last season’s episodes. In fact, the highly-publicized arrival of Vanessa Williams’ Renee was actually the low point of the hour. Don’t get me wrong: I’m a huge fan of Williams in general and her UGLY BETTY persona, Wilhelmina, in particular. But come on… who didn’t know the second Lynette began talking about her friend with the fabulous life that by the end of the night, it would be revealed Renee’s stock had plunged lower than the neckline on her portrayer’s dress? The plot that found Susan preparing for a life in softcore porn was equally predictable, although it could morph into a fantastic little story in which her attempt to moonlight for cash winds up involving her in a dangerous world behind her comprehension. (But let’s face it, under Mark Cherry, it’s pretty much a rule that all Susan-related plots be played for laughs, meaning in two or three weeks, this story will be dropped like that bombshell Carlos will soon be unleashing on poor Gaby. No, for me, the promise comes from the returns of Paul Young and, more importantly, Felicia Tillman (played by the incredible Harriet Samson Harris, whom many will remember from her awesome portrayal of FRASIER’s agent, Bebe). While I’m sure that — as in every single season so far — what starts out as an exciting mystery will quickly become boring thanks to too-few plot developments spread over too many episodes, with this show, I’ve learned to take what I can get.
I wanted to love RUNNING WILDE if for no other reason than the talents involved, but for now, I’ll have to settle for being in like with it. This is through no fault of leads Will Arnett and Keri Russel, who perfectly embody (respectively) blustering billionaire Steven and cute-if-clueless Emily. Rather, the pilot simply felt a little too forced. All the trademarks one would expect from a show executive produced by three members of the ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT team are in place… and in a way, that might be part of the problem. Some of the quirks are too familiar (the voiceover by Stefania Owen’s precocious pre-teen, Puddle). Others are too over the top. (Until now, I’d have thought one could never get enough of miniature horses. Turns out, I was wrong.) Then again, I wasn’t blown away by the ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT pilot, and that show went on to become one of my all-time faves.
Your Comprehensive Guide to Jumping on the LONE STAR Bandwagon (Plus 18 Other New Fall Shows!)
Just because the Big Four (Yes, we’re talking to you ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC) made it virtually impossible to sample their new Fall offerings by inexplicably scheduling most of them up against both each other and a slew of returning favorites last week, doesn’t mean that it’s too late for you to jump on the bandwagon. In fact, courtesy of the wonder that is the modern day series of tubes we like to call the internet, there are a multitude of options should you regret last week’s decision to watch THE EVENT over say FOX’s LONE STAR. Options that are now accessible at the click of a button thanks to our handy-dandy comprehensive guide to online TV options found after the jump..