Posts Tagged NBC

CJ Wallis on Please Subscribe

Posted by admin in Film, late night TV, streaming video on June 30, 2010

The basic concept of the Please Subscribe documentary (“Please Subscribe follows YouTube celebrites David Choi, Happy Slip, Daxflame, and Tay Zonday as they discuss how online media and YouTube has affected each of their lives and the face of entertainment.“) sparked my interest fairly quickly. The documentary, made by CJ Wallis and the Soska Sisters, hopes to play at several film festivals in the near to long term.  I recently conducted an email interview with Wallis. In addition to this documentary, according to Wallis: “I recently directed/edited/conceived the forthcoming Sarah Slean music video and am currently in development on my debut feature film, Frank Flood.  The girls are getting a ton of attention for Dead Hooker In A Trunk and are currently in development on two scripts. I also have some original music under the label Elective, which is also going rather well.”

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TV: Parenthood Gets Picked Up For Second Season

Posted by admin in Uncategorized, episodic TV on April 21, 2010

So news broke on Tuesday that NBC’s Parenthood has been picked up for a second season. I love this ensemble cast series and particularly the work of Craig T. Nelson and Bonnie Bedelia. So far in this season, the show has not given Bedelia many scenes, but I am happy to say last night’s episode shone more of a spotlight on her.

Here’s a snippet of the show, just to hopefully spark your interest.

Added bonus, every week the show’s producers offer best of quotes from the episode. Here’s this week’s batch.

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Cable & Coco: Well Played, George Lopez & TBS

Posted by admin in late night TV on April 13, 2010

You’re TBS–a cable channel not exactly known for late night talk shows. You entered the fray last year, giving TV actor/stand-up comic George Lopez (Lopez Tonight).  Fox goes after Conan O’Brien (aka Team Coco) only to find it challenging from an affiliates standpoint (they were locked into myriad syndicated deals for years, making 11 PM unavailable). TBS steps into the void and with Lopez’s help (as detailed in this Bill Carter [the late night expert at the New York Times] piece) gets O’Brien to commit to a show starting in November 2010.

If you’re TBS, you want to get O’Brien marketing his brand on TBS ASAP. But NBC has a clause preventing him from appearing on TV until June. What do you in the interim? This.

Well played, TBS. And I can’t wait for November.

And in the meantime, I will check out Lopez Tonight, because of the classy way Lopez viewed gaining O’Brien as an opportunity and happily offered his 11 PM time slot (committing to midnight).

Speaking of Lopez, he did a great bit last night acknowledging O’Brien and even “interviewing” Coco. Good stuff.

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Shows Cancelled Too Soon: 2007′s Journeyman

Posted by admin in episodic TV, streaming video on January 15, 2010

Another series partially hurt by the Writer’s Strike of 2007, but mostly canceled due to low ratings, was 2007′s Journeyman. While the show, about an unwilling time traveler (played by Kevin McKidd) and its impact on his family, only last 13 episodes, it’s a delightfully far-reaching 13 episodes. Set in San Francisco, in one episode toward the end of the 13-episode run, they even deal with the 1989 earthquake. Despite its limited run, I loved how the show explored family dynamics, like an adult son’s sense of abandonment (from when his father left the family) coupled with his fear that his time-traveling would force him to abandon his own son.

The casting of Reed Diamond as McKidd’s brother was an amazing bit of casting–as they looked like they could be brothers.

It’s unlikely to ever be released on DVD, but fortunately Hulu hosts the entire 13-episode run.

To get you started, here’s the pilot.

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Les Paul’s Passing Teaches Me About Mary Ford

Posted by admin in Music on August 13, 2009

Try as I might, I cannot absorb all the information in the world. I was reminded of this fact when I read Les Paul’s obituary today. While reading the obituary I learned about Paul’s former wife, Mary Ford, a vocalist who performed with him.

While she died in 1977 (long before I knew to appreciate music or the past), I have lucked out in a sense, because in 1977 laptops and the Internet were nowhere close to existing. So today, when I popped Mary Ford’s name into a search engine, I quickly gained access to 11 episodes of The Les Paul Show (featuring Ford) as well as some YouTube clips.

Paul deserves every bit of praise he gets in the coming days. But I hope one or two folks take a moment to remember his late former wife as well.

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NBC, Hulu and Letterman: How Long Before…

Posted by admin in late night TV on May 22, 2008

So I swung by Hulu.com the other evening and on a lark, I did a search for Letterman to see if they had anything. Much to my surprise they had a documentary (my term, not theirs, and I use this term quite loosely) called Early Dave: The Letterman Tapes (1978-1993). It’s a mixture of Tom Brokaw, Jane Pauley, Tom Snyder and other NBC interviews with Dave, not really a documentary.

They are tightly edited, sometimes annoying so. For example, one Snyder interview they do has Dave along with Merrill Markoe and other folks–whom you never see. Letterman refers to Markoe at one point in the interview, that’s the only way I know, because they edit her bits completely out. Markoe, I dare say, is as funny as Letterman at times and I’m annoyed she was edited out of the piece.

It’s vintage Dave, shown driving his old pick-up truck to his gigs to substitute for Carson. Dave doing a stand-up routine. A tour of his new home, where you can see his beloved dog, Bob, is another interesting bit. A 1970s era Johnny Carson associate Fred de Cordova (with baseball cap no less)  talking to Letterman before a taping of the Tonight Show. Later we see a clip of Letterman talking to Mariette Hartley about his morning show for NBC (I forgot he got a whole 90 minutes with that show…) and an upcoming feature on the show called Stupid Pet Tricks (still in its infancy, I believe). It’s a fun romp leading up to Brokaw’s interview with Letterman on the night of his last NBC show.

I was surprised to find this on Hulu, given that as a Universal property in some ways it is very much an NBC product. And more importantly, while I know Carson had the rights to his Tonight Show (meaning unless the estate/company makes a deal, it will not be showing up on Hulu), was this an effort by NBC to test the waters and ultimately start offering Letterman’s old NBC shows on Hulu?

Part of me would love to see that, but I’m sure it would irk Dave to no end. Maybe I’m wrong on both counts. We’ll have to wait and see. Either way, be sure to check out the documentary for vintage and I do mean vintage Letterman. I would love to know what producer thought it a good idea to have Today show host Jane Pauley interview Letterman while the both sat on an inactive merry go-round…

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