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TV To Talk About

Of all the distractions that have kept me from writing - a protracted illness, a promotion at work, life in general - none has been quite has captivating the past few days as the news from TV pilot season. Though many things change in these modern media times (it's a theme for me, just now), the major networks and their pilot development system has, oddly, not changed all that much. From January to about April, Hollywood busily prepares experimental episodes of dozens of new TV shows, and the networks study and test them while deciding which TV shows live or die for next season's schedule. The biggest change from when I was a kid is that gossip about the pilot process is way more visible now than it ever was, and the "early line" on next season's hot new shows starts... yesterday. Thanks mostly, to Deadline Hollywood  and their TV editor Nellie Andreeva (if you still don't know about Nikki Finke and Nellie et al and you care at all about Film or Television as a business, just hang your head in shame), we get more news these days about the TV pilots than ever, and this past week has been fast and furious as up fronts (the period when Network TV still sells most of their advertising for the coming year) start next week, with new schedules revealed and the general public surprised, happy or saddened with news of their favorite shows. These days, people who really care already know, and the "save my show" campaigns either already happened or generally, it's too late.

In any case, now is a nice moment to recap some of the past TV season as it winds to a close, and we know a lot about who's going, whose staying (and even some of what's coming, though I won't comment on them yet. Mostly). So here are some farewells and some celebrations and some... why did that come back?

First, the farewells:

1. GCB. Based on the novel Good Christian Bitches, ABC been's auditioning this Texas soap for a spot on the fall schedule (presumably, to replace Desperate Housewives, which finally limped to its close). The show focused on Brooke, whose perfect seeming marriage ended at the start of the show with the death of her philandering, embezzling husband, and her return to the wealthy Dallas enclave where her mother Gigi still lives. Their lives revolved around the local baptist church, full of Texas money and sudsy storylines. The show wasn't perfect - a little too much camp, a lot of bitchy arch dialogue, and some preposterous plotting - but for the show it was aiming to replace, it seemed like a pretty good start. Sadly, ABC has decided to go in other directions (let's save our hope for 666 Park Avenue and Nashville, especially), leaving Leslie Bibb still looking for the star vehicle she really deserves.... not to mention poor Kristen Chenoweth, who may never find another role so tailored to her talents.
2. Ringer. Hopes were high when the former Queen of the WB and the first big anchor for the new CW (when they merged with UPN) was coming back in a new series. But the least convincing thing in this good twin/bad twin mixup was the lead herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar, who looked wan and uncomfortable from the get-go (and from what I hear, never got better. I just gave up after three epsidoes last fall). Perplexingly complex, and not in that good way where you care to figure it out, Ringer never found an audience, and I think most fans just want to fondly remember the best days of Buffy when Gellar and Joss Whedon were firing on all cylinders (and, to be fair, you could argue that we remember Buffy herself better than Gellar actually was. I know, sacrilege). In any case, I suspect Gellar's own judgment about her next best role doesn't take into account that she'd be better in a more active, dynamic, and physically demanding part - say a tough talking cop or such. Locked into the role of wealthy man's plaything brings out a kind of passivity in Gellar's performing that was really hard to take.
3. The Secret Circle. The most mystifying of duds, as this witchy poo bit of business followed The Vampire Diaries (built in audience), was created by Kevin Williamson (both Dawson's and TVD), and was based on a book by the creator of Vampire Diaries (i.e., Williamson already knew how to work the source material). And the premise seemed promising - teen witches, sexy derring do, hints of danger and big dark secrets... and then, nothing. Recasting the hot teen blonde boy after 4 episodes was a sign of buyer's remorse at the CW (the kid was wooden... but who isn't in that casting pool?), and the show never found a satisfying tone. But that's just the beginning of bizarre misfires all around (especially making the lead girl generally less likable with every episode), and especially perplexing when The Vampire Diaries seemed completely immune to any of these plotting disasters (providing a gasp filled, near perfect finale to boot). But then, that's Williamson for ya - he shoots for the rafters and when it's good (those shows, Scream), it's brilliant, and when it flops (later seasons of Dawson, Scream 4), it really fails. Here's hoping his next venture works better...
4. Harry's Law. I don't care - and if you're under 55, you probably don't either - but here's another example of network still not believing that older audiences, especially older women, are worth courting, even in large numbers. Harry's Law was actually NBC's second largest drama series in terms of audience, yet they seemd to think nothing of tossing it, while courting not fourth place, but fifth, among major networks (that's right.. on some nights, even Univision beats them). All because Harry's Law was next to nothing in 18-49, but huge in older audiences. We are on the cusp of a moment when senior viewing is bound to matter more (baby boomers in their golden years... anyone?), but apparently, not enough for a legal procedural led by an older female actress who's wildly popular within her age cohort. Which probably means another Emmy for Kathy Bates, and a lot of angry bloggers.
5. Pan Am (and The Playboy Club and Awake and Missing and The River and Alcatraz...). A number of high profile, big budget drama series came and went with surprising speed, with Pan Am being among the most high profile and prominent duds. both Pan Am and the shorter lived Playboy Club tried to get some ziz out of the same neo-sixties vibe that's apparently made Mad Men a hit, but both shows kind of underlined what Mad Men struggles with (and better): that roles for women in the sixties were professionally limiting, highly decorative, and probably caused the Women's Movement. Personally, I thought the Playboy Club explored these tensions better than the others, but of course... they're still Playboy Bunnies and the sexism was especially built in. Pan Am pretty much gave up from the start, trying to lace the obviously dull roles of glorified waitresses with a preposterous Cold War spy story that was more annoying than interesting. But the amazing thing about Pan Am was the obvious enormous expense of it all, recreating Eeno Saarinen's famed Pan Am terminal at JFK, the planes, the foreign locales (and in period)... the question of "and, why?" never entirely went away. Obviously, networks feel that the expense is worth it when shows pan out and become hits... but this season seemed especially loaded with expensive boondoggles (period dramas, pricey - yet untried - talent like Ashley Judd, elaborately scripted fantasy) of questionable long term prospect. And next season, though somewhat reined in, does seem like few execs learned much from their mistakes (though ABC apparently passed on Shonda Rimes expensive, elaborate soap Gilded Lilys, set in the Gilded Age).

 

And, on a happier note, I'm glad to see that these are coming back:

1. The Vampire Diaries and Supernatural. The CW renewed a raft of its current successes - not just these two horror/fantasy shows, but also Nikita, Gossip Girl and 90210 - suggesting that they've found a way to make shows that may fly uder conventional radar, but attract rabid followings nonetheless (If GG can't be called a hit, it's remarkable that its made Blake Lively a fashion and media star, just as one example). Supernatural seemed to have played its big story arc out in six seasons, and the seventh has been touch and go, but as long as the actors are game, I'm happy to stick with it; while the Vampire Diaries has shown remarkable fluidity writing itself into corners and then imaginatively breaking through them. Add in another interesting fantasy show next season along with the prequel to Sex and the City (the Carrie Diaries), and the CW seems poised to remain the network that gets the young viewer.
2. Scandal. I was dubious about yet another Shonda Rimes exercise with a commanding female lead in the world of male power (in this case, politics and Washington wheeling and dealing), but steady underplaying and some effective but uderstated writing have convinced me that Scandal is the real thing - a solid, fairly unique premise that lets talented people shine in a layered ensemble (all that, and it manages to avoid seeming like a pale carbon of, say, The Good Wife). Kerry Washington does, as it turns out, make a captivating series lead, and an interracial affair with the President turns out to be way hotter and more plausible than one might think. Densely plotted, and you have to pay attention... but Rimes gets things about TV plotting that others only dream to know, making it easy to keep things straight and stay interested. What mystifies me is why the other two Shondaland shows - Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice - both of which seem creatively spent, will limp along next year while other, interesting shows fall away (can you sense my GCB bitterness?).
3. Don't Trust the B- in Apt. 23. Comedy's an ugly business these days, full of asinine guys and insulting humor (and yet, I still love me some Archer)... which, somehow is what makes this show about a crass, unlikable woman in the lead all the more offbeat and appealing. Pairing a nice, innocent lamb in the city with a manipulative, selfish but brilliant ne'er do well is hardly new, but nothing on the B- feels stale. And then there's the genius of having James van der Beek play... James van der Beek, shallow and dopey has-been from Dawson's Creek. The byplay between the three leads is smart and refreshing, and the plots, thus far, have been brilliant combinations of sly and sick. If they can keep up the pace set in the first five, the creators are geniuses. If it manages to be merely funny and fresh week to week, I'll take it.
4. Community (and Parks and Recreation and 30 Rock and even Up All Night). It's been a long time coming, but my best friend managed to convince me that Community is way funnier and smarter than I realized (though the computer fantasy room is a cheap and easy write-around of doing some of the hard work). And even though I don't watch it, I know Parks and Recreation is good work. That they both survived predictions of cancellation is heartening, as is the fact that 30 Rock, however imperfectly, will have 13 episodes to wrap up their run as well next year. And, just as heartening, someone saw fit to give the promising cast and premise of Up All NIght a chance to get it together, too (it's Maya Rudolph's quasi-Oprah that really has me interested in what they can do). All these shows suggest that good comedy can be more than cheap insults and white guys being just jerks. And that deserves to survive, doesn't it?
5. The Good Wife. Naturally. CBS may be renewing a raft of dubious nonsense (all those CSeyes, the twin NCISesses, that awful show with Tom Selleck as the head of the NYPD, never mind what passes for comedy there), but they are also renewing what's fast become the jewel of network prime time, an intelligent interesting show with a lot of fascinating characters you care about and follow week to week. That's what television, I think, is supposed to be. And, at least, the one show that proves how to do it well these days is still there.  

Worst Song Ever: Out With The Old, Out With The New...

Something old, something new... I haven't heard a lot of terrible in a while, but when they do... jeepers.

Bryan Adams, Summer of '69. Lazy, lazy, lazy: never mind that Adams can't be the protagonist of the song (he was 10 in 1969), or the failure to evoke a decade as tumultuous as the sixties were, no, let's just wonder about "best days of my life," the line meant to imply this summer - remember, when his "band" broke up - was amazing because he met some girl and it just seemed to "last forever" when, of course, that girl's no longer in the picture and his rock aspirations amounted to even bigger, better things. Yes, the song, basically, is an insult to us al, dreamers or not, who fixate on our past as if it were golden, or reject holding onto the past because there's no point. Cynical, lazy and obvious, Summer of 69 is just corporate rock with little more than profit in mind. And no, I don't hate all Bryan Adams. What was really insulting about this song was that the same fairly sexy, smart songwriter who mixed pain and pleasure in "Cuts Like A Knife" (and showed up in one of MTV's most casually arresting videos) ultimately resorted to it. And no, I don't think "Canadian" is the perjorative for it.

Nicki Minaj, Starships. I freely admit, I don't entirely get Minaj or her success, but I don't entirely depise it: Super Bass has its charms (boom ba loom ba boom ba boom boom bass, indeed), and somebody should indeed know who the f*** I is. But that song came from Stargate, a production team recently profiled in The New Yorker's creative arts issue (I don't hate all New Yorkers, either, natch) along with this song's writer, Ester Dean. The article is especially deadly for the way it pulls back a Wizard of Oz-like curtain on the team's approach to songwriting, what they term "hhok plus hook plus hook" which appears to mean the layering on of easy catch phrases (going a long way to explaining a lot of their work with Rihanna, like the atrocious "S&M"). Starships, produced by another, Stargate-like team, is a good example of how the process can fail, all meaningless catchphrases loaded on top of one another until complete incoherence is achieved. It's not the song is lazy, overprocessed, or not undeniably catchy - it's all of these. It's the astonishing amount (obviously) of money, time and effort spent to put complete gibberish onto a digital hard drive as if it did, indeed, mean something. 

Maroon 5 (featuring Wiz Khalifa), Payphone. Let's be honest, it's hard being Maroon 5; hard being a band who zoomed to the top of the charts in about 1 and a half albums, rethinking Chic-era bass heavy disco beats as stylish, designer rock music for the upscale lounge set, and proving, on a string of hits (not to mention some pretty choice album filler), at least a dozen ways to reinvent that wheel.  That success is due, in no small part, to Adam Levine, possessed of one of the highest, most graceful tenors in pop, able to sound yearning, sweet and sublimely sad, often all at once (She Will Be Loved, for starters, Misery to follow). Levine's also an offbeat heartthrob, which explains his budding success as the latest thing in Reality show TV judging on The Voice. But, alas, success will spoil Rock Hunter: Levine is, more or less, phoning it in for this lazy Chris Brown viaTaio Cruzish, Usher-lite single, which can't even be bothered, lyrically, to either set itself in a past where payphones actually mattered, or somehow explain why the central image of a payphone even matters to the point of the song. Instantly forgettable, yet still featuring a vocal jump that borders, even for Levine, on screechy, Payphone is the first time I've felt like Maroon 5 is cashing the check rather than putting in the effort. And yes, Moves Like Jagger did kind of hint at this development, but even that, egregious Xtina notwithstanding, made up in verve what it lacked in panache. Levine may not have moves like Jagger, but his own style is sexy enough, most of the time. Here's hoping the album isn't a complete dud.

Articles We Never Finished Reading: Not That Different From Each Other

Let me tell you about the very rich,” F. Scott Fitzgerald famously wrote, buttonholing the reader in his short story “The Rich Boy” (1926). “They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand.” Today’s rich are not only different from you and me but different from yesterday’s.

No one who has followed the heedless speculation that led to the 2008 financial meltdown and the subsequent bailouts would think of millennial-era greedheads as being anything other than steel-toed in advancing and achieving their interests; it is the rest of us who appear soft, our trust playing us for suckers. The distance between Fitzgerald’s very rich—now the extremely rich, the 1 percent—and the remaining 99 percent has never been steeper. The 1 percent occupy a higher altitude than the rest of us: their clouds look fluffier; their sunlight gleams with Hollywood gold. In Theodore Dreiser and Sinclair Lewis novels and in film classics from the previous century, the rich are portrayed as builders and expansionists, their pharaoh fortunes amassed from steel, brick, minerals, timber, railroads, shipbuilding, newspaper publishing; even those who won their money on Wall Street seem propped on industrial girders. Round-bellied, a watch fob looped from a vest pocket, these bankers and tycoons command offices as grand as railway stations, eat in dining rooms fit for Versailles. What they do and how they live have weight, imprint. The vast wealth depicted in movie/TV drama today is divorced from manufacturing and an invisible army of laborers doing their part; it’s divorced from anything resembling work. It’s floating and caressing, immortalizing.

- the generally perceptive James Wolcott, blathering about images of wealth on TV in the latest issue of Vanity Fair.

Now I generally like Wolcott, and I especially like him when it comes to culture watching - he takes it seriously, and he watches a lot - but this one is weak. Never mind the kind of lazy premise, a chance to quickly rope in a wide swath of series television in a highly generalized observation; the problem actually lies in the premise itself - his notion that somehow wealth today is vastly different from wealth in the past. This is just absurd - the first decade of the Twentieth Century was called The Gilded Age for a reason, and it wasn't because the men who made fortunes were "builders and expansionists"; it's because they made enormous profits in their businesses, and even more money in stocks and financial dealings. The Rockefellers and Vanderbilts, Morgans and Whitneys and Astors were not especially different from the wealthy bankers and hedge fund types of today: flush with absurd amounts of cash, spending it on pointless displays of generally poor taste. Wolcott generalizes off of Theordore Dreiser and Sinclair Lewis... as if he's never heard of Edith Wharton or Henry James, the real chroniclers of this life of ease and indolence. Indeed, he goes so far as to dress up this middling case with a familiar line from the greatest of these observers of wealth, Fitzgerald himself, as if to miss entirely the point of The Great Gatsby.

I'm not trying to suggest that film and television are doing some great job dramatizing the realities of life as most of us face them; but what's deeply problematic in Wolcott's narrow view is some sense that This Just Happened and It's Not Like How They Used To Do It. The reality is... this is exactly how they used to do it, and it works. And perhaps the most telling failure to see this lies in Wolcott completely overlooking the largest and most tasteless display of excessive wealth: Downton Abbey. Or doesn't that count?

Why I Watch The Oscars, Part 2

Just a suggestion, skip the excruciating banter between Chevy Chase and Paul Newman. This was the year of the Writer's Strike.

 

 

Why I Watch The Oscars, Part 1

 

Saturday Singalong: And It Hurts Me More Than You Know, So Much More Than It Shows...

Because today is her funeral, and because I am still not over it:

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday Singalong: Eighties Exotics

My "off and on" has been more off than on... again... so I'm working on easing back into it. Let's see how this goes. How about some tunes that came back to my mind lately?

Africa, Toto. Possibly the weirdest left field, mainstream oddity to ever chart this successfully; nothing Toto ever did, before or since, quite explains the allure of this pulsating, midtempo jam, or the enormous success of "IV", the album from which it sprang. And lyrically... who knows? Something about midlife crisis, a changing relatioship and the African continent, though God knows how that's all supposed to fit together. And it does - the shimmering harmonies, the tribal beat, the loppy lines ("sure as Kiliminjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti" - it's not just descriptive, it's accurate) - all of it works quite beautifully, and surely helped expose a wide swath of pop radio listeners to exotic rhythms and instrumentation. That's one of the things about the misbegotten "eighties revival" - it's easy to miss the role of left field hits like this.

Shock the Monkey, Peter Gabriel. Among many - Sledgehammer and Big Time, fer sher - this one manages to straddle both eccentric exotic and slyly oversexed. If you don't know what it's about... I'll never tell what we theorized as kids, but then I always thought "She Bop" was more direct. I don't know if you can exactly dance to it - I think we tried in college, a lot - but once I hear it on the radio, I am tapping along. Monkey, monkaiee, monkey...

King of Pain, The Police. Zenyatta Mondatta is probably the more world beat of their albums, but Synchronicity hit a sweet spot of commercial success, owing considerably to the fact that The Police were early and enthusiastic adopters of the potential for music video. And plenty of the album works well, but nothing quite captures teenage angst like this ("there's a little black spot on the sun today... it's the same old thing as yesterday..."). Not quite as spare as Every Breath You Take (and not as stalker-ish, either), King of Pain is a great example of how the sound of the Police was constantly evolving and growing. Which is why liking them was both visceral - God they were hot - and cerebral (my third college roommate, a brilliant woman, was simply mad for Sting. A lot of it rubbed off). It's only lately, I think, that Sting has slowed down.

Rio, Duran Duran. Another example of the "right place, right time" argument for their success - video and early MTV surely catapulted Duran Duran to the top - that can overlook the substantive aspect of their music. The one-two punch of Hungry Like the Wolf and Rio was effective because nothing quite sounded like that up to then; the driving quitars, the screaming sax, the exotic rhythm, the wash of synths behind it. Combine that with a lot of sexy business (and more creepy stalking - "at the end of the drive, the lawmen arrive" - sheesh), and the whole thing is kind of undeniable.

Love Plus One, Haircut 100. Though much of the grief for Dire Straits' "Money For Nothing" ("that little faggot is a millionaire") is about George Michael, it's also the case that the song was slamming successes like the far more obscure Haircut 100, who enjoyed a flurry of attention for this song. In retrospect, it was hardly worth the derision; they were indeed flash in the pan, one minor hit wonders. But gosh they were cute, and this song, loping along as it does, has its charms.

Too Shy, Kajagoogoo. Another example of the pretty, pretty boy bands that the Brit New Wave produced, full of exotic looks (Limahl, their one named lead singer) and sounds. And also, another overlooked gem of what made the eighties such a weird, wonderful time - for a minute there, the potential to have a hit and get on the radio seemed especially wide open, and the result was a lot of interesting, and rather ambitious music; I'd argue - and still do - that it was real renaissance moment for pop. And if today's music let's me down, it's partly because I grew up believing in a lot of the possibilities.

 

 

The Best Of What We Saw, 2011

Finally.

I had some fun with this two years ago, just compiling various movies and TV that impressed me over the past year, and realizing that I didn't have to make it "best movies" or "best TV shows" or anything else... no rules! Whee!

So, herewith, a compendium of 2011. Not the best year to write home about... but not the worst, either.

1. The Closer (TBS, all seasons) - The Police Procedural genre is pretty much played out these days, killed (whamp-wah) by Law and Order, where SVU limps along begging to be killed. (Remember when Mariska Hargitay was a tough talking butch girl with a boy cut? Who's that glamour gal who replaced her?) Or consider CSI, which I find all but unwatchable, except Miami, where "train wreck" doesn't begin to describe the self parody of David Caruso. Or all of the tongue in cheek variations of the procedural on USA. All of which is why I initially dismissed Kyra Sedgwick leading an LA Homicide division of major crimes. But Sedgwick, as it turns out, is still the real thing: a remarkable actress with one of the great parts for a woman over 40 on TV just now, making the most of it. And her southern accent is just darlin', too. Add to that some of the better writing on a whodunnit show of late, and the result is eminently watchable, all of the time. Like SVU used to be, without quite so many of the creepy pervs.

2. Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty (at the Metropolitan Museum of Art), and Daphne Guiness (at the Museum at FIT). The big fashion exhibit of the past year was a blockbuster show (literally) of the Met's Costume Institute, a retrospective of recently passed designer Alexander McQueen. I was one of the last to see it, having stalled all summer, and I'm sorry I waited, though not that sorry, since the exhibit was mobbed from beginning to end. After standing in a two hour line, the rooms were all but impossible to navigate, for all the crowds, but the payoff was reveling in the genius of McQueen, in an exhibit that barely scratched the surface of his complex vision. McQueen committed suicide, depressed about losing his mother and apparently uncertain about his future, but Savage Beauty made the case that his prospects were genuinely limitless. But, oh, those crowds!  What was impossible to fathom was why McQueen generated this much audience - summer, tourists, curiosity... but really, it made next to no sense: people with no real interest in fashion, cruising around an admittedly arresting set of displays, barely comprehending the man who could do leather bondage jackets or tartan ballgowns with equal fluidity and grace. Savage beauty, indeed. The real kudos probably go to Anna Wintour, who draped her prominence and Vogue's name across the whole affair, and helped push the Met to finally commit to an expansion of the Costume Institute, including more gallery space. Long overrdue, and all you needed was a mob to prove it. Without the mob, you get graceful, inventive shows like Daphne Guiness at Fashion Institute of Technology, where the clothes had room to be seen (from all angles), and Guiness' own devotion to McQueen made more sense in the context of one woman's fabulous closet. 

3. This Week with Christiane Amanpour (ABC, cancelled). When ABC announced the brave step of hiring Christiane Amanpour for its Sunday weekly news discussion, I was both thrilled and anxious - would Amanpour rise to the challenge of doing a different kind of show or would she, like Fareed Zakaria on CNN, do a dull show of pet causes and inaccessible narrowly tailored topics? The answer was surprisingly a bit of both, and then some. Amanpour expanded the reach of Sunday shows, delving into foreign affairs like no one else on network TV, and assembling unexpected panels of enexpected views (and true to form, put herself in harm's way in places like Egypt and Libya). Moreover, she had the nerve to do a townhall of American Muslims and their detractors, leading to some impressive, intense confrontations. Still, her disdain for the horse race aspects of American politics and the "who's in/out" discussions of the DC elite showed, and she struggled to make these discussions cvompelling. But then... who isn't just now? For whatever reason - and I suspect it was mutual - ABC and Amanpour gave up as the year drew to a close. This past week's return to the ordinary - a lumpy, less interesting than ever George Stephanopolous - was not auspicious, and as they have since losing David Brinkley, ABC can't seem to decide if they want to do better than NBC, or just photocopy them (and frankly, David Gregory's quite unimpressive as well). One of the few bright spots of political coverage in 2011 is gone and now, in a more interesting year, we have even less. Why must the audience be punished?

4. The Good Wife (CBS). It's got it all: a grown woman in the lead role, women who talk to one another about something other than getting or attracting a man, interesting cases, and intelligent dialogue. I'm not even a huge fan of Julianna Margulies and I have to admit... she's got it, right now. And who else has a supporting cast this deep and rich - Christine Baranski, Archie Panjabi, Chris Noth, Josh Chares, Alan Cumming, Mary Beth Peil... I mean, come on. Of Course, it's basically a glossy soap opera with some legal drama thrown in... but hey, I love a glossy soap opera, and I'm not apologizing for it.

4. Archer (Seasons 1 and 2). The best animated series you're probably not watching. Yes, it's demented and sick... and wrong, but nobody's doing it better. It was hard to figure out how they could top Season 1, but from Archer's baby to Cheryl's millions (well, her family, the Tunts) to Pam's history a hard drinking bare knuckle brawler, nothing was entiurely what it seemed, and everything was up for taking up to, and past, the limit (if nothing else, of good taste). Just as a for instance... until Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, I had no idea that "The Honey Pot" had actualy been a serious spy term. Nor, until I tripped over it online, did I realize they were serious about Krav Maga, the new mixed martial arts discipline. And more of it is just around the corner.

5. The Artist, which restored my faith in silents.

6. Higher Ground, which respected my faith.

7. Downton Abbey (PBS). Sure, it's your basic glossy pre-World War 2 British costume drama on steroids - Upstairs, Downstairs at My Brideshead Revisted in my Gosford Park and all that jazz - and sure, it's so top heavy with those usual British names (I swear I just saw a scene where Maggie Smith banters with Diana Rigg!)... but hell, can anyone fight it? Why would you? To its credit, Julian Fellowes - who also wrote Gosford, and is the current go-to guy for storytelling the British landed gentry - is careful to both cater to the fascinations while subtly undercutting the business entirely. Never has titled nobility both seemed so chic, and yet so unnecessary. It's all very well done - and it was a hoot watching it trample Mildred Pierce at the Emmys - but it's all so... typical, really, isn't it? It's what we all think Masterpiece Theater always does... and here they are, doing it. Let's not overdo the idea that somehow, that makes it brilliant. 

8. Burn Notice (season 4). My Chirstmas present from Mom, since she can't bring herself to buy most of the things on my Amazon wishlist. Still. It's enough that she gets me a gift I wouldn't necessarily get myself - as much as I've enjoyed this show, between vampires and other night creatures, there's not much time left for super spies. Which is a shame, because Jeffrey Donovan, Gabrielle Anwar and Bruce Campbell have gelled into a tight, natural ensemble, aided, now, by Coby Bell as yet another burned spy. And that's before talking about Sharon Gless, whose performance has been demanding an Emmy for a while now. I'm not done yet... but so far, it's immensely satisfying. 

9. My Week With Marilyn.

10. The Vampire Diaries (Seasons 2 and 3, The CW)). It wasn't until Spring that I fully appreciated Season 1 of Vampire Diaries on TV, and by then, Season 2 was ending on the CW... so I bought every episode, one at a time, on Amazon (and then I went and got the DVD anyway). By September, the question was whether the show, which had managed to up its own ante in Season 2, could keep on an upward trajectory... and remarkably, so far, it largely has. Balancing a large cast and multiple stories has its challenges, but Kevin Williamson (along with co-creator Julie Plec) has reasserted himself as a master of merging the fear (and violence) of horror with the teen angst of high school dramas. Which is why the fizzling debut of similarly themed The Secret Circle has been such an odd disappointment. Vempire Diaries remains my example of not dismissing genre pieces aimed at youthful audiences - this is better writing, and surprisingly good acting, more than much of series television these days, surely better and more convincing than a genre killer like Twilight.

11. Midnight in Paris. 

12. Bridesmaids. And we'll get a sequel!

13. Supernatural (Season 6, The CW). With a near pitch perfect conclusion to a five season long story arc, Supernatural faced a "what now" question for much of Season 6 (the season when, it seemed, they thought they were cancelled, only to be renewed). As it turned out, there was plenty to explore, much of it, naturally, quite dark. From soulless Sam to Dean's inner demons to Bobby's gruff stoicism, each of the leads had plenty to work with and explore... and then it turned out that Misha Collins' angel Castiel was the real secret weapon of the whole thing. Now the only problem is... what do they do with Season 7? Hopefully... more than they've done thus far.

14. RuPaul's Drag Race (Season 3, Logo). Raja, Raja, Raja! And Yara, Alexis, Manila, Carmen, and Shangela... Halleloo! The bitchiest season yet, more drama, more tears, more catfights and some damn fine drag, from start to finish. Much of it courtesy (as usual) of runner up Manila Luzon, easily one of the most beautiful men doing drag ever (though yes, Carmen Carrera was indeed stunning, and didn't even need clothes). In the end, despite the silly division into two competing camps, talent and graceful artistry shown through, and if Raja seemed a little predestined to win (she's known RuPaul for years, apparently), she did nevertheless earn it (and nearly lost out, lip-synching for her life), with some stunning looks and some inspired performances. But it was just the overall increase  - in talent, in intensity, in sheer size -  of the show into must see television week to week that lifted it wig and shoulders above the rest. As RuPaul, Inc threatens to take over Logo (can anyone else deliver reliable programming to them?... no seriously, can they?), another Drag Race is about to begin... and already looks like...a winnah. Cue Ru's maniacal laughter. 

The A-List: Drama, Queens, And Silver Foxes

I debated whether to go back and review Season 2 of The A-List: New York, but reality intervened: for all my interest in jumping back into watching it... I got busy, and the work of catching up didn't quite happen.

And it just seemed long - Season 2 wrapped up a couple of weeks ago, the "reunion" was this past Monday (with more to come next Monday), Going to parties and saying bitchy things, sure... but 13 weeks of it? God help us.

And if God was a DJ... the music would be a lot louder by now.

I just finished catching up on the New York reunion, and caught the first episode of A-List: Dallas, and between them I think lies the relative pleasures and pain of watching reality shows built around a group of close knit gay men. What seemed merely slightly disappointing about New York in Season One has become impossible to ignore; while Dallas offers, it seems, mostly fresh meat, in every sense. Whether the bloom falls off the Texas rose as much as the Manhattan one, we shall see.

In one sense, I'm not sure the shows are exactly the same: while New York's conception of "A-List" was about an "almost famous" kind of success-by-association game (which, for Season 2, just seemed smaller and sadder), Dallas is more brass tacks. In a smaller, southern, gay community, a lot of what defines "A-List" is not semi-celebrity, but money. And the Dallas cast fairly drips it.

And that, really, may be more in tune for Logo's audience, in some ways, than New York. The initial promise of "A List" after all, was that we would see some suggestion of really well known gays, in fashion or design or hairdressing... or something. Instead, the small cast of "who are theys" mostly interacted with each other, until the show devolved, by the end of Season one, into a vacation from hell at Reichen's family's Maine summer home (which, if nothing else, is terribly unfair to Maine). 

In Dallas, on the other hand, one doesn't expect any real boldface names, and fame isn't the issue. And, so far, the situation is way more incestuous, and perhaps more in tune with the real gay life of more gay men in the smaller cities. So when the religious semi-closeted Republican fundraiser has a crush on the sexy underwear company executive, along with the trust fund party boy and the successful real estate developer... I suspect I wasn't alone in nodding knowingly at every sudsy turn. Ah, to be twenty two and stupid and tipsy again!

Okay, so not... but that's what The A-List is all about, and either it has an appeal or it doesn't. New York, I think, for all the interest it's generating online (or so they say), seemed dismal and repetitive this season, all bitching and backbiting with little relief, and the addition of a wild card straight woman seemed disruptive. One of the things that struck me about season one was how it captured a lot of the reality of a gay man's life in New York, a life very separate from women, straight or gay. As season two devolved into "who does or doesn't like Nyasha", a sense of the show's central organizing principle got a bit lost. And also... generated a good bit of "who cares." It's telling, I think, that the biggest outlier of New York's cast - photographer Mike Ruiz - both came off as more sensible and sane than his costars, and also quickly decided that doing this is not for him. And Ruiz offered a put-down that really stood in, I think, for a wide swath of Logo's older viewers, pointing out that as you get older, there's really no need for a lot of pointless drama in one's life.

Whether Dallas can avoid the pitfalls - whether familiarity, in other words, simply does breed contempt - remains to be seen; at first blush, the cast is charming enough, the relationships engaging and the world on display at once familiar and fresh. For more than a few northerners, I suspect, this world will really seem quite alien. Just from my time spent in Baltimore, and traveling, I'm impressed with the way they captured the flavor of modern urban southern life, in all its garishness and inherent contradictions, the mix of familiar gentility and a more up to date racy edge (and, let's all note, the show is very, very white, which is at least an honest nod to how separate southern gay communities reflect the basic segregations of southern life). Unlike New York, the show has more sexual tension and a greater nod to the romantic lives of its main characters. 

Bottom line, of course, is that Logo won't amount to much with a world of "original programming" that makes it the gay Bravo (I know! Like Bravo isn't that, anyway!) - all "Drag Race" superstars mixed with "Real Gays of [Name Your Town]". (And, just an aside, let's ask... what, were Miami and Los Angeles busy? How about San Francisco? Jeez...) The A-List is an all fluffy, cotton candy exercise in TV that improves no one, and tells us very little... except that, still, these gay lives, in all their shallow details, are still lives that don't otherwise get entirely seen. It's a shame that New York seems to have to have lost sight of what ittle value it can bring to the conversation, of puttting some "realness" into the mix of TV's discussion about gay men's lives. For now, that "realness" in all its perplexing sexiness and shallowness, seems to be better served in Dallas. Which, suddenly... I find fascinating.

Saturday Singalong: Purple Reign

Because Paisley Park is in my heart:

The Family, Nothing Compares 2U. I am one of the few people who, when Sinead O'Connor released her version, said "Oh, what a nice idea to remake that song" while other people looked blank. The Family was a studio band created by Prince out of the remnants of The Time, when Morris Day left to go solo (and shortly after Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis went off to form Flyte Time). Paul Peterson, renamed St. Paul (Minneapolis and Christ references in six letters!), served as the lead singer, backed by Susannah Melvoin (Wendy's twin sistrer). In reality, Prince wrote and recorded much of the album himself, then added the vocal tracks from St. Paul and Susannah. If you listen careffully, you can hear him, quite obviously in the backup, as well as on much of the rest of the album (Titled "The Fsmily" - get it, the family album?). As I was deeply into Prince a the time (more on that in a minute), I am one of the few owners of the album, and this song really stuck with me. And while I think Sinead did a lovely job, Peterson's yearning vocal, and Susannah's ghostly gospel backup strike me as more mood appropriate. 

Chaka Khan (featuring Melle Mel and Syevie Wonder), I Feel For You. This too is a remake, Prince's version having been on "For You" years before. That's a nice version with a striking new wave vibe, but in the hands of Chaka's longtime produce Arif Marden, the song became a mini-opera of all that she is capable of doing. One of th earliest pop hits to incorporate rap seamlessly into the mix, I Feel For You didn't quite sound like anything else at the time, nothing like Chaka's previous recordings, and was one of those near perfect dance records that didn't really need a remix. 

Bangles, Manic Monday. A lot of people object to "C'mon honey, let's go make some noise" as a reference to sex; I find it clever. Originally written for Apollonia Six, Prince eventually gave the song to the Bangles, since he liked their sound (and, it's suggested, because he had a crush on Susanna Hoffs). The song is actually credited to "Christopher", referring to the Christopher Tracy character Prince Payed in Under the Cherry Moon (yeah, I saw that, too).

Sheila E, The Glamorous Life. Although I had already been listening to and liking Prince (thanks to early MTV, we got exposed to 1999 and Little Red Corvette), it was Purple Rain that turned me into a rabid fan. In large part, it was because Prince was really the first celebrity I ever thought I looked like (Michael Jackson, at his Thriller moment, I got a lot of. I didn't agree). None of which necessarily explains why I so completely got into The Glamorous life, except that Prince was clearly all over making Sheila Escovedo a star, and by that time, I'd follow him anywhere. What else can you say? The Glamorous Life is just about perfect, a simmering, percolating piece of pop salsa  that's a reminder that the best dance music comes from a cracking band, who could probably keep going for hours, not some computer generated remix.

Vanity 6, Nasty Girl. The Glamorous Life, by the way, was originally written for Vanity 6, a reminder of just how much importance Prince put on lead singer Vanity. Watch her in the Soul Train Clip to se just how assured she is, given a deeply smutty lyric, and her relative inexperience. The whole idea for Vanity 6 is indeed sexist and dreadful, and Nasty Girl is, at heart, pure stripper music. But I have a decidedly soft spot for stripper music, the frank expression of sexuality done to a raunchy beat (at heart, that's what I really like about jazz, and even the best Broadway show tunes). And the song, for all its suggestiveness, is actually about freely expressing fantasies (Do you think I'm a nasty girl?). The answer, after all, could be no.

Prince, Adore. In the end, what I like best about Prince is not the obvious; not the When Doves Cry and Let's Go Crazy, the 1999 and Raspberry Beret. What I love is that the deeper you go, the more there is to discover. Adore is tucked away on Sign O' The Times, an enormous double record that is really probably three albums of material, but not enough of any of them separately. There's a dark, new music album about social problems (the title track), the usual sex and dance anthems (U Got the Look, I Could Never Take The Place of Your Man), and then there's a whole gospel vibe as well, which is where this ace slow jam comes in. A complete mash note, Adore simmers away as Prince begs and pleads for the love of a girl, but then he drifts away on repeating how much he adores the girl until "Adore you" becomes a whole gospel chorus. It's as good, better really, than Marvin Gaye at his "Let's Get It On" best, with similar payoffs.