View Full Version : Hot Off The Press! The Latest Television News and Info
I thought there was nothing like Gifford, Meredith and Cosell, myself.
I love to listen to Al Michaels call a football game...I'm very happy he will still be doing this on ESPN. The rest of the group doesn't matter to me. Esiason was the worst hands down.
Chuck
Your favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in antyime in 2005: Prison Break, Bones, Invasion
Your favorite three veteran prime-time shows: Lost, NCIS, House
Your favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows: Battlestar, Dead Zone, 4400
Your favorite three TV actors: Dominic Purcell, William Peterson, Hugh Laurie
Your favorite TV sports production: Monday Night Football
Your favorite TV news program or (cable net) as the case may be: FNC
The show the critics most overlook: Battlestar
The show the critics most over-hype: How I met your mother
The actor who makes you cringe
The dumb cop on Monk
The actress who makes you cringe Pam Anderson
The one show you would hate most to miss – or for your DVR or TiVo to screw up: Lost
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season: Cold Case
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors: Lost
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD? Battlestar
First off I would like say thanks to Fredfa for the template to use :)
Your favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in anytime in 2005:
Grey’s Anatomy
Bones
Surface
Your favorite three new prime-time cable shows:
Starved
Wanted
Weeds
Your favorite three veteran prime-time network shows:
Alias
Lost
Veronica Mars (does 1 1/2 seasons and going count? )
Your favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows:
Nip/Tuck
The Shield
Rescue Me
Your favorite three TV actors:
David Caruso
David Boreanaz
(Posthumous Mentions)
Jerry Orbach
Your favorite three TV actresses:
Kristen Bell
Mary-Louise Parker
Rachel Nichols
The show the critics most overlook:
NCIS
The show the critics most over-hype:
Arrested Development ( I like this show but geez...)
The actress who makes you cringe
Kathryn Morris
Pam Anderson
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season:
All the Law & Orders and Crossing Jordan
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
Surface
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
The original series on TNT,FX & SciFi
Tabasco
12-24-05, 07:53 PM
Your favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in antyime in 2005:
My Name is Earl (only new show I watched)
Your favorite three new prime-time cable shows:
N/A
Your favorite three veteran prime-time shows:
Arrested Development
CSI
Lost
Your favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows:
Battlestar Gallactica
NFL Primetime
South Park
Your favorite three TV actors:
Michael Cera (AR)
N/A
N/A
Your favorite three TV actresses:
Jessica Walter (AR)
N/A
N/A
Your favorite TV sports production:
Real Sports
Your favorite TV news program or (cable net) as the case may be:
FNC
The show the critics most overlook:
N/A
The show the critics most over-hype:
Grey's Anatomy
The actor who makes you cringe
Caruso in a runaway
The actress who makes you cringe
Marg Helgenberger (CSI)
The one show you would hate most to miss – or for your DVR or TiVo to screw up:
Arrested Development
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season:
CSI: Miami
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
CSI
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
South Park, Simpsons, BSG, Family Guy
Sorry for mispellings or for any other errors with names. I usually remember the people by their characters' names. Thanks again to fredfa for this wonderful thread. Merry Christmas.
The “Hot Off The Press” Best of 2005
Your favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in antyime in 2005:
Prison Break, Bones, and American Dad
Your favorite three new prime-time cable shows:
Over There, and Weeds
Rule Bender:
Footballers' Wives( Soapy trash I must Tivo)
Your favorite three veteran prime-time shows:
Arrested Development, House, and 24
Your favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows:
South Park
Rules Bender:
Silent Sundays on TCM
Your favorite three TV actors:
Kiefer Sutherland, Hugh Laurie, and Will Arnett
Your favorite three TV actresses:
Jennifer Garner, Maura Tierney, and Jessica Walter
Your favorite TV sports production:
Your favorite TV news program or (cable net) as the case may be:
A tie between CNN and FNC
The show the critics most overlook:
NCIS
The show the critics most over-hype:
Nip/Tuck
The actor who makes you cringe
David Caruso
The actress who makes you cringe
Mischa Barton
The one show you would hate most to miss – or for your DVR or TiVo to screw up:
24
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season:
Show: Simpsons Actor/Actress: Melina Kanakaredes
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
Arrested Development
I am very heartened at how diverse our interests seem to be. It makes me feel a little more comfortable about the wide variety of items I post here -- or subject you to.
At any rate, it is still early in the balloting (and you have plenty of time to get your votes in) but here are the early returns from the “Hot Off The Press” TV Programming Poll:
Favorite new network prime-time shows which debuted in anytime in 2005:
My Name Is Earl 3
Bones 2
Grey’s Anatomy 2
Prison Break 2
Surface 2
Everybody Hates Chris
Invasion
Law & Order: Trial By Jury
Medium
Related
Favorite new prime-time cable shows:
The Closer 3
Over There 3
Weeds 3
Wanted 2
Always Sunny in Philadelphia
American Dad
Bones
Footballers Wives
Prison Break
Starved
Favorite veteran prime-time shows:
Arrested Development 3
House 3
Lost 3
NCIS 3
24 2
Veronica Mars 2
Cold Case
CSI
Nip/Tuck
Rescue Me
The Shield
The West Wing
Favorite veteran cable prime-time shows:
Battlestar Gallactica 2
Rescue Me 2
The Shield 2
South Park 2
4400
Dead Zone
Monk
NFL Prime Time
Rescue Me
Silent Sundays on TCM
The Sopranos
The Wire
Favorite TV actors:
Hugh Laurie 5
David Boreanaz 2
Jerry Orbach 2
Will Arnett
Zack Brack
David Caruso
Michael Cera
Jason Lee
William Peterson
Gary Sinise
William Shatner
James Spader
John Spencer
Kiefer Sutherland
Favorite TV actresses:
Kristen Bell 2
Maura Tierney 2
Jessica Walter 2
Patricia Arquette
Dana Delany
Jenna Fisher
Jennifer Garner
Mariska Hargitay
Melina Kanakaredes
Stephanie March
Rachel Nichols
Mary Louise Parker
Sandra Oh
Favorite TV sports production:
MLB on HDNet
Monday Night Football
NHL on HDNet
Real Sports
Favorite TV news program or (cable net) :
Fox News Channel 3
CBS Evening News 2
CNN
Show the critics most overlook:
NCIS 3
Battlestar
How I Met Your Mother
Related
Show the critics most over-hype:
Arrested Development 2
Commander In Chief
Desperate Housewives
Grey’s Anatomy
How I Met Your Mother
Nip/Tuck
Actor who makes you cringe
David Caruso 4
Matt LeBlanc
William L. Peterson
Jeremy Piven
William Shatner
Actress who makes you cringe
Pamela Anderson 2
Lara Flynn Boyle 2
Mischa Barton
Marg Helgenberger
Jill Hennessy
Jennifer Love Hewitt
Kathryn Morris
The one show you hate most to miss:
Lost 2
24
Arrested Development
Veronica Mars
Former favorite which has lost your interest:
Alias
Cold Case
Crossing Jordan
Lost
Law & Order
Law & Order: CI
Law & Order: SVU
The Simpsons
(Actress: Melina Kanakaredes
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
Lost 2
CSI: Miami
NHL
MLB
NFL
SEC Football on CBS
Smart Travels, PBS and HDNet
Surface
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
Battlestar Galactica 3
Arrested Development
Family Guy
Grey’s Anatomy
The Simpsons
South Park
Veronica Mars
The West Wing
Original series on FX, SciFi and TNT
The Best TV Shows of the Year
Neighborhood Dealers and Sleeper Cells Next Door
By Alessandra Stanley The New York Times December 25, 2005
THE COLBERT REPORT. It started on Comedy Central as a one-man, one-joke routine: Stephen Colbert doing a parody of conservative cable foghorns like Bill O'Reilly and Joe Scarborough. But his show keeps getting better. Some nights, it is funnier than "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart," which launched Mr. Colbert's career.
SLEEPER CELL. This Showtime series is "24" for smart people. An African-American F.B.I. agent, and practicing Muslim, infiltrates an Islamic terrorist cell in Los Angeles. He looks at hate from both sides now.
WEEDS. Mary-Louise Parker as a pot-dealing suburban mom and Elizabeth Perkins as her snooty, sardonic neighbor are sublime - the Joan Crawford and Bette Davis of premium cable. "Weeds" and "Sleeper Cell" are proof that Showtime has a reason to live.
HOUSE. Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie) has his own physician's code of conduct, a Misanthropic oath: first, do some harm. He mercilessly mocks and terrorizes patients, their families and co-workers before solving a medical mystery each week. As addictive as Vicodin.
HURRICANE KATRINA REPORTING. Ten days that shook the television world: harrowing live coverage changed how Americans view the federal government and the news media. Even Fox News was outraged.
GREY'S ANATOMY. It might as well be called "Sex and the City Hospital," but now that "Desperate Housewives" has lost its edge, these love-seeking surgeons are a fun Sunday-night replacement.
COMMANDER IN CHIEF. Nobody likes a goody-goody government, but Geena Davis is terrific as a leader beyond reproach who becomes the first woman president - the unHillary.
LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT. Not the Vincent D'Onofrio episodes, but the new ones with Chris Noth and Annabella Sciorra. She brings a hint of film noir mystery to every scene.
THE CLOSER. Kyra Sedgwick doesn't need to see dead people to solve crimes in this TNT series. She is a Southern belle version of Kathryn Morris on "Cold Case." They are a new kind of cop: Hitchcock blondes with a badge.
MARTHA. Fascinating. Martha Stewart is shedding the giddy, girlish persona she adopted for her post-prison comeback and, in her new syndicated show, reverting to her old self: grimly competent and self-serious.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/arts/television/25stan.html?pagewanted=print
CPanther95
12-24-05, 10:28 PM
Take a break, Fred - and have a very Merry Christmas.
Best to you, too, CPanther!
DoubleDAZ
12-24-05, 11:38 PM
I thought there was nothing like Gifford, Meredith and Cosell, myself.I don't generally watch football just for the sake of watching football. If the Packers aren't on (and sometimeseven when they arethisseason :) ), I find something else to watch/do. But, I almost always watched MNF when those 3 were the broadcast team. I enjoyed them more than many of the games, they were a riot and Dandy Don always had me ROTFLMAO when he started his, "The party's over" routine. :)
DoubleDAZ
12-24-05, 11:57 PM
Favorite new network prime-time shows which debuted in anytime in 2005:
Grey’s Anatomy
Prison Break
Medium
Favorite new prime-time cable shows:
The Closer
Over There
Wanted
Favorite veteran prime-time shows:
House
Lost
24
Favorite veteran cable prime-time shows:
Battlestar Gallactica
Dead Zone
The Sopranos
Favorite TV actors:
Hugh Laurie
William Shatner
John Spencer
Favorite TV actresses:
Kristen Bell
Maura Tierney
Patricia Arquette
Favorite TV sports production:
NA
Favorite TV news program or (cable net) :
Fox News
Show the critics most overlook:
NCIS 3
Battlestar
Numb3rs
Show the critics most over-hype:
Arrested Development
How I Met Your Mother
Nip/Tuck
Actor who makes you cringe
NA
Actress who makes you cringe
Lara Flynn Boyle
The one show you hate most to miss:
24
Former favorite which has lost your interest:
Alias
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
Lost
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
Everything I watch, I'd watch in SD if I had to.
Sorry I missed this column Friday on Festivus Day. And in the spirit of the season, I will not highlight the “winners”.
The Disappointing TV Developments of the Year
A bagful of disappointments
It's time for our annual Festivus roundup of letdowns
By Alan Sepinwell and Matt Zoller Seitz Newark Star-Ledger Staff Friday, December 23, 2005
Start limbering up for the feats of strength, because it's Festivus time!
Since "Seinfeld" ended, we spend every Dec. 23 honoring the holiday created by angry old man Frank Costanza (technically by "Seinfeld" writer Daniel O'Keefe's dad), an alternative to the commercialization of Christmas, Chanukah and the rest of the December gift-giving fests.
So gather 'round the aluminum pole for the airing of the grievances to all the members of the TV family who disappointed us in 2005, and remember -- Festivus isn't over until you pin your father!
We're disappointed with...
Cookie Monster, for participating in the politically correct fraud that is the new "Sesame Street" healthy eating campaign. For 35 years "C" was for cookie, and that was good enough for us. All of a sudden, we were supposed to believe you'd rather be eating carrots or broccoli or boiled fish? Monster, please.
The executives of E!, for picking "The Simple Life" up off the scrap heap and continuing Paris' unfortunate moment in the spotlight. What, you're too good for Tara Reid, but Paris and Nicole are acceptable?
Dave Chappelle, for bugging out to Africa before he could come close to finishing the third season of "Chappelle's Show." To quote Lil Jon, "WHAT?"
Ray Romano and Phil Rosenthal, for ending "Everybody Loves Raymond." Sure, your finale was one of the best sitcom swan songs ever, but now that you're gone, who will make us laugh? Freddie Prinze Jr.?
"My Name Is Earl," for making its title character's criminal past so much livelier and funnier than his do-gooder present. Speaking of flashbacks, we're also disappointed in ...
"Lost," for having the opposite problem. Fans want to know what's happening on the island right now, and the show's increasingly reductive, flabby flashbacks get in the way while telling us stuff we already knew. And...
"Lost," for using any excuse possible to not move the plot forward, from showing the standoff in the hatch three different ways in three straight episodes to having Michelle Rodriguez's Ana-Lucia angrily shout down any questions that might clarify what happened to the passengers in the tail section. And...
"Lost," for the producers' phony indignant response to all the complaints about the first-season finale, which promised to reveal what was in the hatch, then faded out without showing us anything.
"The Amazing Race," for wasting a season on the lame "Family Edition" concept, which featured too many contestants and too much time spent within the continental United States. If we wanted to see someone cross the Delaware, we'd pile into the Munchmobile and do it ourselves.
Stephenie LaGrossa, for coming back to "Survivor" a second time and promptly erasing whatever good will she'd earned losing so gracefully the first time around.
Ricky Gervais, for following up the amazing "The Office" with the just-okay "Extras," another in a seemingly endless line of HBO inside-show biz comedies. Everyone feared the American "Office" would be a disaster; instead, it's been consistently funnier than "Extras."
Powerful live TV buffs, for using their network clout to force us to sit through very un-special episodes of "Will and Grace" and "The West Wing."
David Letterman, for finally luring Oprah Winfrey onto his show and then fawning over her like Rosie O'Donnell interviewing Tom Cruise. And ...
Oprah, for not smacking some sense into Cruise while he was bouncing up and down on that couch. (You can make up for it by hiring a deprogrammer to rescue Katie.)
CBS' reality show division, for airing "The Will," a despicable, badly produced show about an aging millionaire's relatives competing to inherit his beloved ranch. Only one episode aired before the network came to its senses and canceled the thing, but it was one too many.
CNN, for overreacting to Fox News Channel's ratings success by encouraging local news-ish stunts, and ...
CNN, for joining the vogue for missing persons melodramas, and ...
CNN, for putting lynch mob harpy Nancy Grace at the center of Headline News, and ...
CNN, for simultaneously injuring the careers of Aaron Brown and Anderson Cooper by dumping the former and seizing on the latter's raw, real Katrina moment to package him as a wet-eyed, navel-gazing parody of an anchorman.
Bill O'Reilly, for misusing his considerable power to promote the idea of a "war on Christmas," writing himself a fake angry letter on the subject so he could repudiate it in a mailbag segment, calling for a boycott of supposed Christmas-hating retailers on his radio show in weaselly language designed to let him deny he was calling for a boycott, and otherwise giving a divided, exhausted nation one more thing to squabble over. He's become a parody of a parody of himself; Stephen Colbert without the jokes.
"Empire Falls," for wasting great source material (the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Richard Russo, who also wrote the script) and an almost perfect cast (minus Helen Hunt) on a mediocre adaptation. Ed Harris, Paul Newman and company hit most of the novel's notes, but where was the music?
Fictionalized biographies of Pope John Paul II on ABC and CBS, for making one of the 20th century's most influential, controversial, fascinating men as bland and safe as those descriptions of presidents that American public school children still snooze through.
Pat O'Brien, for leaving drunken voicemail messages that have rooted in our brains like skunkweed. And let's not forget ...
Dr. Phil, for participating in O'Brien's on-air intervention and rooting O'Brien's exhortations even deeper in our minds by playing those voicemails yet again.
VH1, for continuing to enable alcoholic, steroid-abusing, self-pitying fame junkie Danny Bonaduce with his reality show "Breaking Bonaduce" -- and for going ahead with the project even after Bonaduce slit his wrists halfway through filming.
Bravo's "Being Bobby Brown," for trying to make Bobby so cuddly and safe that he made the "Osbournes" version of Ozzy look like the '70s version of Ozzy.
NBC, for allowing executive Jeff Zucker to fail his way up the corporate ladder after he left the network's primetime schedule in ruins. Also for benching "Scrubs" while letting "Joey" jack up one bad joke after another for months.
And finally, bringing the "Seinfeld" connection full circle:
"Curb Your Enthusiasm," for cranking out episode after episode this year that felt like the product of a "Curb Your Enthusiasm" plot-generating software program. Yes, the finale was great, but not great enough to erase a season's worth of sighs.
http://www.nj.com/columns/ledger/alltv/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-0/1135319271271700.xml&coll=1
For most of the people in the United States, Christmas has arrived. For the rest of us it is just minutes away.
So, if you have missed my greetings over the past few days, let me wish you again a
M E R R Y C H R I S T M A S !
H A P P Y C H A N U K A H!
Or, if you prefer:
H A P P Y H O L I D A Y S!
It is my hope that however you celebrate this season you will find joy, warmth, comfort and love with family, friends and those who are special in your life.
Critic’s Notebook
For a surefire ratings winner, just put 'CSI' in the title
By Vince Horiuchi The Salt Lake Tribune
I consider myself a fairly savvy television watcher. At least I know how to program my VCR so the clock stops blinking.
But I can't for the life of me understand the nation's obsession with police shows that do nothing more to enhance the art of storytelling than show us how to swab blood from a severed ear.
According to Nielsen Media Research, seven of the 10 most-watched series last week were what we high-brow television critics call "legal prodecurals," police dramas that are more about solving a crime than the characters surrounding it.
The week's top six shows were "CSI," "NCIS," "CSI: NY," "Without a Trace," "Criminal Minds" and "Cold Case." A seventh such show, "CSI: Miami," was No. 10. Two others made the top 20: "Numb3rs" (14) and "Law & Order: SVU" (19).
I'm asking someone - anyone - to help explain why these crime shows are so popular. Why has the original "CSI" been No. 1 for several years?
Is it the fetching Marg Helgenberger, who plays a fetching crime technician in "CSI"? Or is it the nifty slow-motion special effects of bullets ripping through human organs? Or perhaps it's the allure of dripping, mangled body parts as ripped skin flaps delicately in the wind?
What can't be the reason is a riveting story. None of these shows have what you would call a real narrative.
I watched an episode of "CSI: Miami" a couple of weeks ago because it was about video gamers who commit bank robberies and shootings in the vein of a "Grand Theft Auto" game.
Sure enough, there were special-effects sequences galore, and the show had the solid production values of a film (thanks to big-shot movie producer Jerry Bruckheimer, of "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Armageddon" fame). But the story was ridiculously shallow.
Episodes of "Cold Case" that I've seen were just as bland, and "Criminal Minds" is just too unpleasant to watch. And in the case of the "CSI" franchise, I'm still hard-pressed to believe that crime technicians could do all the interviewing, shooting and chasing instead of police officers. All techs do is stuff like taking pictures and analyzing strands of hair (although that job, mind you, is just as important as detective work).
Finally, in all of these series, torture, grisly murder scenes and female victimization are the order of the day. Only the guest stars are different.
Yet America is watching, and the networks continue to introduce new versions of this type of crime drama every fall (one day, "CSI: Provo" will star Donny Osmond, with Wilford Brimley as his crusty boss).
It's odd that Americans who complain of too many negative stories on the 10 p.m. news don't mind a big chunk of ghastly crime in prime time.
http://www.sltrib.com/tv/ci_3336145
M E R R Y C H R I S T M A S !
H A P P Y C H A N U K A H!
Saturday’s network prime-time ratings have been posted at the top of Latest Prime Time Ratings news which is the second post in this thread.
The party's over
'MNF' ends ABC run with startling legacy
By Bob Raissman The New York Daily News
The greatest legacy ABC's "Monday Night Football" will leave is not a product of Howard Cosell or Don Meredith. Nor is it about Frank Gifford, Roone Arledge or Pete Rozelle.
When Al Michaels and John Madden preside at the funeral of ABC's "MNF" tomorrow night, as an audience of masochists suffers through Patriots-Jets, the greatest testimonial to "MNF," the second-longest running series in the history of TV, is this: The National Football League actually got ESPN to fork over $1.1 billion per year for eight years to purchase TV rights to "MNF" beginning in 2006.
To a television executive this is all that matters. All those sappy retrospectives make for nice reading and rekindle some fine memories, even if they do canonize some of the most miserable people in the business. And yet the fact that "MNF" is still worth an astronomical rights fee is the greatest tribute anyone can pay (and ESPN did, through the nose) to every man, woman and child who ever worked on the series.
The incredible monetary value attached to the series is even more impressive considering the institution that "MNF" once was has been dead for years. We can debate when the patient's heart stopped beating. We can quarrel over when "MNF" lost its big-event luster and stranglehold on the consciousness of the American viewer.
Some will argue things were never the same after Cosell, a man who could make an offsides penalty sound like a world crisis, quit on his "MNF" colleagues. That theory cannot be dismissed. In reality, there are many reasons leading to the NFL's decision to make "MNF" a cable property and turn "Sunday Night Football," which debuts on NBC in 2006, into its marquee prime-time product.
When "MNF" was born in 1970, viewers had only the three major networks as viewing options. By the time Cosell left, before the 1984 season, cable TV was fragmenting the audience. Even with the competition, "MNF" was a fixture in Nielsen's top 10 for the past 15 years. Problem was the rights fee the NFL charged ABC for "MNF" made it impossible for the series to make any money.
And as the years passed, and ABC continued swimming in red "MNF" ink, it was clear network suits were struggling in an effort to make "MNF" feel important again. After Cosell split, ABC brought in seven different analysts to try to create a buzz, including comedian Dennis Miller in 2000.
Perhaps the cruelest irony in all this is that over the past 10 years or so, ABC got stuck holding a bag full of bad games. Going into each season, ABC's sked looked good on paper, but by the time NFL mediocrity infected the product, the broadcasters were calling games that were neither compelling nor competitive.
So it is fitting that tomorrow night the curtain comes down with Patriots-Jets, which back in August may have looked like an attractive matchup, but now could turn out to be the lowest-rated game in the history of "MNF."
The fact ABC's "MNF" lasted more than three decades clearly reflects the cockeyed nature of the sports TV business. Here you had a network paying the NFL major dough for the right to broadcast what ultimately became a junk schedule. And now, ESPN is willing to pay even more to take it over.
It should be interesting. The NFL has always been smart about controlling its exposure, but is now on its way to oversaturation. Viewers will have NBC's Sunday night package and, in all likelihood, the NFL will add a package of seven Thursday night games. And, of course, there is Fox and CBS Sunday regional offerings as well as the package of games offered on satellite TV.
By the time Monday rolls around will anyone be ready for some football?
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/col/braissman/
It is still not too late to vote -- the polls are still open!
(In case your ballot got lost in the Holiday mail pile.)
By the way, feel free to fill in as many – or as few – of the categories as you would like. A hint: Use this as a template. Just use the "quote" function, fill in your picks, undo the "quotes" and post your picks.
What – or Who -- Would You Pick?
The “Hot Off The Press” Best of 2005
It is the end of the year, and the TV columnists have been busy putting together their best and worst lists of 2005. But why should they have all the fun? Let’s join them. So, please post your favorites in the following categories:
Favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in anytime in 2005:
Favorite three new prime-time cable shows:
Favorite three veteran prime-time shows:
Favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows:
Favorite three TV actors:
Favorite three TV actresses:
Favorite TV sports production:
Favorite TV news program or (cable net) as the case may be:
Show the critics most overlook:
Show the critics most over-hype:
Actor who makes you cringe
Actress who makes you cringe
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season:
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
If you would prefer anonymity, note your picks and send a PM – I’ll be happy to post your choices without your name attached. Your guilty pleasures will be safe with me!
Off-Beat TV Picks for the Week Ahead
What says holidays like . . . monkeys?
By Peter Ames Carlin The (Portland) Oregonian Sunday, December 25, 2005
(Note: All times are Pacific, so check your local listings.)
A week that begins with a joyous observance of faith (choirs, cathedrals, vigorous demands for figgy pudding) ends in a night of drinking, debauchery and Carson Daly. Which makes a lot more sense than the sudden influx of monkeys on the TV schedule.
Yeah, that's right, monkeys.
No, I don't know what it means. I don't make up the TV schedule. I just report the facts and try to come up with a wisecrack or two.
Maybe it's the figgy pudding that attracts the simian types. Maybe you don't know the kind of ravenous hunger you'd have for figs, butter, brown sugar and milk until you've spent a day swinging and climbing ashcan-over-teakettle through the jungle. This is not a carefree existence, not even close. There are snakes, for one thing. Natives with blowguns. And a terrible case of Carson Daly envy. Because, really, what separates him from your average jungle-born ape?
And don't mention opposable thumbs, either. Not until you've taken a really close look at his hands.
TODAY
8 p.m. "Bobby Short at the Cafe Carlyle" (Ovation): No monkeys at the Carlyle. Not now, and especially not when Bobby Short, New York's favorite cafe singer, was holding court. He's gone now, but his charm -- and exquisite way with the American songbook -- live on.
MONDAY
9 p.m. "My Gym Partner Is a Monkey" (Cartoon Network): Again with the monkeys! This cartoon takes place at Charles Darwin High School, a public institution attended solely by animals. And one human kid who matriculates as a result of a computer error.
TUESDAY
8 p.m. "Wanted: Ted or Alive" (Outdoor Life): "Here I come again now, baby/Just like a dog in heat." Rock 'n' roll similes don't get more, uh, striking than that. And now Ted Nugent, aka the Motor City Madman, aka a rocker-turned-strangely charming survivalist wack-job, forces contestants to turn various indigenous creatures into sausage. Or else.
9:30 p.m. "Cops" (Court-TV): A repeat of one of the Portland-based episodes. So here's your chance to see your neighbors, friends and possibly yourself in all their drunk, disorderly and (most disturbingly) shirtless glory. People, please. If you must turn felonious, and ineptly so, put on a T-shirt. Or at least do some sit-ups first.
WEDNESDAY
9 p.m. "Bigfoot" (National Geographic Channel): A documentary about recent sightings of the biggest monkey ever. And he lives in the neighborhood. Or so they say.
SATURDAY
New Year's Eve: Hey, look, it's Dick Clark! And he's still doing New Year's Eve! I think I first uttered that sentence in 1976, when Dick's rockin' eve would have featured the likes of Chicago, Natalie Cole and maybe Starbuck ("Moonlight Feels Right"). The Monkey King only knows where those bands are tonight, but Dick Clark is still in Times Square for yet another "Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve," (10 p.m., ABC), which reports from Times Square with performances by Mariah Carey, Duran Duran and the Pussycat Dolls. Meanwhile "NBC's New Year's Eve With Carson Daly" swings into 2006 with Mary J. Blige performing, all starting at 11:30 p.m. MTV gets into the act at 10:30 p.m., too, with "MTV's New Year of Music," with live performances from Kanye West, Shakira and Young Jeezy, among others.
Where are the Monkees tonight?
http://www.oregonlive.com/living/oregonian/peter_carlin/index.ssf?/base/living/113504192928430.xml&coll=7
Moss, Cosell, the Bucs and the NFL's best rivalry
My top 5 MNF games
By Don Banks sportsillustrated.cnn.com
I'm not all misty-eyed for the passing of ABC's Monday Night Football, but after 36 seasons and many incarnations, it has earned its status as a pop culture icon. And now, once the Patriots and Jets tee it up this coming Monday, it'll be time to say good-bye.
Like any other kid growing up in the 1970s, I liked Monday Night Football for two reasons: Getting to stay up later than normal on a school night to watch the halftime highlights, and for one of the best pieces of opening theme music in TV history: "Duhnt-duhnt-duhnt-duh!!''
Say what you will about the announcers, the glitzy new formats ABC trotted out every few years, or the late nights that inevitably rolled into early Tuesday mornings, we did watch. We had to watch. It was must-see TV before they ever invented must-see TV.
Here are five of my favorite MNF memories:
1. Vikings 37, Packers 24, Oct. 5, 1998
This was the night that Randy Moss officially became the NFL's Next Big Thing. I was covering the game as the Vikings beat writer for the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and while we knew by then that Minnesota's rookie receiver had some rare play-making skills, he hadn't really taken over a game quite like he did that night at cool and blustery Lambeau Field.
Moss, playing in just his fifth NFL regular-season game, caught five Randall Cunningham passes for 190 yards and two touchdowns (52 and 44 yards) as the stunned Packers fans saw the undefeated Vikings bring Green Bay's club-record 25-game home winning streak to a resounding end. Minnesota led 37-10 early in the fourth quarter, and I'll always remember how Moss and Cunningham (who finished with 442 yards passing) appeared to be playing their own personal game of pitch-and-catch.
2. Packers 12, Bucs 9, in OT, Dec. 12, 1983
This isn't a game that's going to make anyone's list but mine, but I was there in Tampa Stadium that night that Howard Cosell called his final Monday night game from ABC's booth. But that's not what made this late-season game between two also-rans memorable.
Leave it to Bucs head coach and noted quipster John McKay to do that. Tampa Bay, headed for a 2-14 season, lost to the Packers thanks to kicker Bill Capece missing both an extra point and a 35-yard fourth-quarter field goal attempt. Green Bay capitalized on Capece's miscues and tied the game on a Jan Stenerud field goal late in regulation, and won it on another Stenerud three-pointer early in overtime.
After the game, McKay was asked about his struggling kicker and got off one of his most inspired lines: "Capece is kaput. There will be no more field goals kicked by the Bucs this year, no matter what the score is. I'm tired of being crucified.''
Capece was cut soon after, and the next week, new kicker Dave Warnke missed a field goal and an extra point and shanked three kickoffs in a three-point loss at Detroit. Fed up with kickers, McKay then had 300-pound offensive tackle George Yarno kick the Bucs' final PAT of the season.
3. Dallas 31, Washington 30, Sept. 5, 1983
The Cowboys and Redskins played a bunch of thrillers on Monday night, and this was another classic in their heated rivalry. But it's remembered as the beginning of the end for Cosell, who said of diminutive Redskins receiver Alvin Garrett during one catch and run: "Look at that little monkey run!''
It was the season-opener of Cosell's final year in the MNF booth, and his comment drew a firestorm of criticism, given that Garrett is black. Cosell insisted that he has used the "little monkey'' label on short, fast white players in the past, and the record bore him out. But the damage was done, and Cosell never really seemed his confident, bombastic self again that season.
I was watching that night from the sports department of the St. Petersburg Times, while working my first newspaper job during college. I heard what Cosell said and knew instantly he had a controversy of his own doing on his hands. Within hours he had been denounced nationwide by a collection of voices, proving just how powerful and high profile the MNF platform had become.
4. Minnesota 31, Dallas 27, Jan. 3, 1983
You watched Monday Night Football because you never knew what you might see. Like the bored fan who flipped off the TV cameras in the Astrodome in the early 1970s, or the gruesome breaking of Joe Theismann's leg by Lawrence Taylor in 1985.
But no matter how much football you watched, how many times could you ever possibly hope to see a 99-yard touchdown run? But that's what Cowboys running back Tony Dorsett pulled off at the Metrodome on this night, racing down the right sideline for the longest run in NFL history.
I can still hear MNF's Don Meredith adding "and a half'' to Frank Gifford's excited call of the 99-yard ramble, which began on the Cowboys' one-half yard line. It was the final game of the strike-shortened 1982 regular season, and that once-in-a-lifetime play alone helped make up for the seven weeks we had endured without the NFL that fall.
5. Denver 17, Green Bay 14, Oct. 15, 1984
Was there every any better television in the history of MNF than the night an early-season Rocky Mountain snowstorm turned the Broncos-Packers game into the visual treat of all that Denver orange and blue (and Green Bay green and yellow) set off against a blanket of white? The game was played in a driving snowstorm that obscured the field under an ankle-deep layer of the white stuff.
As for the actual game, it was pretty much decided early, as Broncos defensive backs Steve Foley and Louis Wright both returned fumbles for touchdowns in the game's opening minute, before the Packers seemed to have their bearings in the cold.
Though the Broncos played host to many memorable games in the 1970s and '80s, the Snow Game was probably the signature moment of creaky old Mile High Stadium.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/don_banks/12/22/topfive.mnf
Turning out the lights on Monday Night Football
BY Barry Horn The Dallas Morning News
DALLAS - Monday Night Football goes out with a whimper not a bang after 36 seasons on ABC. The 3-11 Jets against defending AFC champ Patriots in the finale makes it a stinker of a game.
The meaninglessness of the game, however, should ensure lots of reminiscing and schmoozing about the good old Monday Nights on ABC.
``It's a TiVo game,'' says MNF producer Fred Gaudelli. ``There's a lot of history in this.''
Dandy Don Meredith, who gained more fame in the MNF booth than under center for the Cowboys, will appear through the magic of videotape. His rendition of Willie Nelson's "The Party's Over" will turn out the lights for ABC.
Frank Gifford, who along with Meredith and the late Howard Cosell made up the signature Monday Night booth, will be along as well.
Cosell died in 1995. One can only imagine what his reaction would be to the demise of the institution that elevated him from sparring sessions with Muhammad Ali and made him a star.
Joe Goldstein, the legendary New York public relations man straight out of Damon Runyon and longtime Cosell confidant, thinks he knows.
"I don't think you could print what he would say," Goldstein said. "Needless to say, he'd be very disappointed."
Of course, Monday Night Football will march on next season courtesy of ESPN, whose cable reach is 90 million homes, about 20 million fewer than ABC.
Expect the drum beating to be deafening. No one is better at self-promotion than the self-proclaimed "worldwide leader in sports."
However, NBC, the new home of football on Sunday nights, has already fired the first shot at MNF on cable.
NBC is calling its effort Football Night in America.
The implication? Sunday is the more democratic night with the bigger potential audience.
You can be sure NBC will heavily promote John Madden moving from Monday to Sunday nights. The network will also remind how close Al Michaels came to joining him not for a bigger salary but rather a bigger stage.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/sports/13477162.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
The Serial Dramas
Tune In Next Week (but Log on Tomorrow)
By Kate Aurthur The New York Times December 25, 2005
While stand-alone procedural dramas like "CSI," "Without a Trace" and "House" are the backbone of the Nielsen Top 20, this year it was shows like "Lost," "Prison Break," and "24" that incited the most fervor in their audiences. Those series - with their baffling conspiracies, multifaceted plots and breathless tempos - required an unusual degree of commitment from viewers. To keep them engaged, or to reward their engagement, the networks use podcasts and episodes on mobile phones to seed discussions on message boards and fan Web sites, those global equivalents of water-cooler conversations.
It seemed that everyone wanted in on the act. The previous fall's "Lost," a hit for ABC, begat this fall's "Invasion," also on ABC, "Surface" on NBC and "Threshold" on CBS - all science fiction shows with similarly elaborate story arcs.
But nearing the season's midpoint, the only one of the new shows to grab the audience's imagination is "Prison Break" on Fox, in which an inscrutable hunk (Wentworth Miller) gets himself sent to jail in order to break out his brother (Dominic Purcell), who is on death row.
Why did "Prison Break" break out? One thing it shares with "Lost" is just-right pacing. A series about an escape timed to the ticking clock of an execution must dole out its action sparingly - which in the wrong hands can mean excruciatingly. But Paul Scheuring, the show's executive producer, has given a lot of thought to how to make viewers feel intrigued without making them feel frustrated. "You're always giving up something so they never feel like they're being ripped off, and you're introducing new mysteries that hopefully have equal interest," said Mr. Scheuring, who has painstakingly outlined the first two seasons. "It's a fine balance of storytelling."
Damon Lindelof, an executive producer of "Lost," wondered how that balance could be maintained. "There's a Catch-22 implicit in the serialized nature of that show, which is that they can never get out of prison," he said in a telephone interview. In other words, then what?
But when Mr. Lindelof isn't worrying about other people's shows, he's busy stitching together the countless narrative strands and obscure clues that make up each episode of "Lost." "Obviously," he explained, "it's our goal that when all is said and done, people will look at the entire puzzle and say: 'I can now watch the pilot and understand where the polar bears come from. They told me how Locke ended up in a wheelchair. They told me what Kate did.' " But that doesn't make it any easier to time those revelations. "We can only control how fast the car goes, but we have no brakes," he said.
Few serialized "mythology" shows have managed to tell a complex story in a way that is both satisfying and comprehensible throughout the entire run; more common are the examples like "Twin Peaks," which flamed out quickly, or "The X-Files," which underwent a painfully long unraveling. Carlton Cuse, who is also an executive producer of "Lost," said, "We do feel like we're a little bit in uncharted territory."
For longevity and viewer satisfaction, Fox's "24," which will begin its fifth season on Jan. 15, has turned its strict one-day-equals-one-season format into a surprisingly freeing device. The show's structure is more like a reality-show competition - an "American Idol" or a "Survivor" - than an epic arc: each season is a slow-motion sprint to the finish line. And then it restarts on a whole new day. (It's a format viewers might see more of next season: NBC has ordered a pilot called "Kidnapped," about an abducted teenager, and 20th Century Fox Television is developing "Crisis," a real-time series about terrorists at a Miami resort.)
Could "24" go on forever? Peter Liguori, Fox's president of entertainment, and the man who decides these things, said: "I look to the James Bond movies, where there is a compelling character at the core of every one of those stories. So with the assumption of the talent wanting to be with the show, yes."
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/arts/television/25aurt.html?pagewanted=print
A Critical View:
Awards show delivers with consistency
'Kennedy Center Honors' is the most elegant show of its type on television
By Hal Boedeker Orlando Sentinel Television Critic December 25, 2005
Oprah Winfrey salutes Tina Turner. Quincy Jones and k.d. lang honor Tony Bennett. Paul Newman, Willie Nelson and Glenn Close pay tribute to Robert Redford.
There's no lack of star power in the 28th edition of “The Kennedy Center Honors”, television's classiest awards show. CBS presents the program, which taped Dec. 4, on Tuesday. A network release explaining the event suggests CBS has another winner.
For the third year in a row, Caroline Kennedy hosts this celebration of career achievement in the arts. Lavish retrospectives unfold in this order for the five honorees: actor-director Redford, singer Bennett, actress Julie Harris, dancer Suzanne Farrell and rock superstar Turner.
The crowd shots are always a bonus. The Washington audience includes President Bush and first lady Laura Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Ted Kennedy.
Former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw begins the tribute to Redford and notes that some of the actor's roles were a stretch. "Does anyone believe it would take a million dollars for Demi Moore to run off with Robert Redford?" Brokaw asks.
Newman, Redford's co-star from The Sting, jokes about the tricks the two men have played on each other. Actress Close recounts her first meeting with Redford before filming The Natural. Country superstar Nelson sings "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys."
Quincy Jones says that Bennett has "always had this beautiful, sweet light and sound glowing over him.'' Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis plays Bennett's signature song, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco."
Then four singers honor Bennett: Vanessa Williams on "The Best Is Yet to Come," Diana Krall on "Fly Me to the Moon (In Other Words)," Grammy nominee John Legend on "For Once in My Life" and lang on "What a Wonderful World."
Kevin Spacey opens the tribute to Broadway actress Harris by saying, "I speak for the entire community of theater when I say we have admired her choices, her determination, her gift and her dedication to her craft."
Alec Baldwin, Mary-Louise Parker and Helen Mirren salute Harris with more glowing words. A splashy rendition of "Broadway Baby" unites Christine Baranski, Karen Ziemba, Leslie Uggams, Tyne Daly and Michele Lee, who co-starred with Harris on TV's Knots Landing.
In honoring Farrell, Jacques D'Amboise calls her a "demon of a dancer." The Suzanne Farrell Ballet Company performs George Balanchine's Divertimento No. 15.
Winfrey opens the Turner celebration by touching on one of the singer's best-known songs. "We don't need another hero," Winfrey says. "We need more heroines like Tina Turner."
Queen Latifah starts the musical tribute by singing "What's Love Got to Do With It."
Other singers tackle Turner's big hits: Melissa Etheridge on "River Deep, Mountain High," Beyonce on "Proud Mary" and Al Green on "Let's Stay Together."
Among awards shows, The Kennedy Center Honors usually offers a sublime experience. It looks as if the center has done it again.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/entertainment/tv/orl-haltv2505dec25,0,3170231,print.story?coll=orl-caltvtop
Best of 2005
2005 saw some provocative twists on the traditional
By Alan Sepinwall Newark Star-Ledger Sunday, December 25, 2005
Idiot box? Nah. Vast wasteland? Forget about it. The best television of 2005 managed to entertain at the same time it was stirring up debate about pressing social issues, including a space adventure that's really a 9/11 allegory, a foul-mouthed Western that looks at the roots of law and order in America and a high school drama about a cute blonde private eye whose cases always seem to revolve around the widening gap between the haves and the have-nots. Here are my picks, in descending order.
1. "Battlestar Galactica" (Sci-Fi): Our nation suffers a brutal attack by a group of religious zealots who believe they're God's chosen people. The military, civilian government and media spar over the proper way to wage war on the terrorists. The president starts invoking God at every turn to drum up voter support. Opinions are split when it's revealed that soldiers have been torturing prisoners of war.
The latest installment of "Frontline"? Try the remake of a cheezy '70s space opera. Producer Ronald Moore and a heavyweight cast led by Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell have reclaimed science fiction from the people who only saw it as an excuse for special effects and technobabble; they're using the spaceships and robots to comment on modern life in the way that sci-fi masters like Philip K. Dick and Rod Serling used to.
2. "Deadwood" (HBO): In Year Two of David Milch's social archaeology of the Old West, civilization came to Deadwood and actually made life in the camp worse, exemplified by serial killer dandy Francis Wolcott (Garrett Dillahunt), brutal pimp Mr. Lee (Philip Moon) and ruthless mining magnate George Hearst (Gerald McRaney). Kidney stones sidelined homicidal saloonkeeper Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) for several painful episodes; by the time he recovered, it was clear that his moral code was stronger than that of the more respectable Hearst.
3. "Veronica Mars" (UPN): Watch it simply as a series of mysteries involving the uncannily smart and composed title character (Kristen Bell), and this is still great television, capable of making you laugh, cry or gasp -- sometimes all three in the same scene. Plus, the first season satisfyingly wrapped up both of its main story arcs with the style and respect for the audience that's escaped bigger shows such as "Lost" and "Desperate Housewives." But Rob Thomas and his writers have higher ambitions than telling new Encyclopedia Brown or Nancy Drew stories. This show is upfront about wealth and class in a way that TV is usually afraid to address; both of season two's big arcs have let the rich and poor citizens of Neptune (a town where you either have servants or are one) take the idea of class warfare much too literally.
4. "Arrested Development" (Fox): How can you not love a comedy featuring a no-nonsense attorney named Bob Loblaw (say it five times fast), a loose seal biting the hand off of a boy-man obsessed with his mother Lucille, a tourist trap called Wee Britain where you drive on the wrong side of the road, a family pageant called Motherboy XXX, a racist ventriliquist dummy, a man with alopecia who wears dress eyebrows, a professional stand-in named Larry Middleman, and an in-denial gay psychiatrist who nearly died from bad hair plugs? Unfortunately, most of America had no problem at all not loving the surreal, intricately written misadventures of the Bluth family, which is why the comedy is on the brink of execution, barring an 11th-hour stay by another network like ABC or Showtime. But if this is the end, it was funny while it lasted.
5. "Sleeper Cell" (Showtime): It dragged in the middle, and the boss switcheroo in the final hours was a mistake, but "Sleeper Cell" worked as both white-knuckle thriller and thoughtful examination of being Muslim in America. When's the last time an action movie or TV show paid more than lip service to the ideals its heroes and villains are fighting for?
6. "Grey's Anatomy" (ABC): Soapy, silly and just a pleasure to watch, this hospital drama cobbles together the best elements of "ER" and "Friends" and powers the stories of competitive, sexually active surgical interns with the best soundtrack on television. One request for the new year: more of Miranda "The Nazi" Bailey (Chandra Wilson), TV's best no-foolishness character since Frank Pembleton on "Homicide."
7. "House" (Fox): The medical cases have become so routine that they're almost besides the point. (Though whoever had Nov. 29 in the pool for the first episode where a patient actually had vasculitis, congratulations.) The best moments of the show are less about identifying the disease of the week than they are about diagnosing the many antisocial tics of the good doctor. The writers have recognized that the brilliant Hugh Laurie will be funny and likable no matter what House does and says, so they've pushed the character's behavior deeper and deeper into the realms of the unacceptable. The "Three Patients" episode with Carmen Electra and the secret of House's limp was so dazzling it probably deserves its own spot on the list.
8. "The Daily Show" & "The Colbert Report" (Comedy Central): If you ever have reason to doubt what an amazing feat Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and company pull off four nights a week, trying checking out the increasingly pathetic spins that "Saturday Night Live" takes on the same material (government incompetency, blowhard talking heads) with a week's time or more. No matter how depressing the actual news gets, it's reassuring to know that these fake newsmen will always find a way to make us laugh about it.
9. "Bodies" & "Viva Blackpool" (BBC America): These two dramas, one bleak and one whimsical, were this year's highlights from the increasingly essential BBC America. "Bodies" depicted a hospital OB/GYN unit ruled by incompetency and bureaucracy with such unblinking focus that it was hard to watch without needing to scream at the television. "Viva Blackpool," meanwhile, paid homage to the late, great Dennis Potter ("Singing Detective") with a joyous, neon-lit murder mystery/musical hybrid.
10. "Rescue Me" (FX): In which creators Denis Leary and Peter Tolan seemed to go out of their way to alternate genius with idiocy. Plot threads appeared and disappeared at random, dramatic moments were undercut by cheap jokes and the female characters all devolved into misogynst caricature. And yet... and yet... moments like Tommy (Leary) inviting a beating to atone for the death of his son, or Chief Reilly (Jack McGee) breaking down over his wife's slide into dementia, or Sheila (Callie Thorne) being abused by her Tommy-esque girlfriend were done with such power and grace and raw emotion that it's almost okay to forgive all the knuckledragging moments. Almost.
Honorable mentions
"Lost," a gripping thriller and character drama when it isn't too busy guarding its own secrets;
Glenn Close playing sparring partner with "The Shield" star Michael Chiklis;
the finale of "Six Feet Under," which came awfully close to redeeming those last couple of seasons;
the finale of "Everybody Loves Raymond," which didn't need to redeem anything but should serve as a model for any sitcom approaching the end;
"Project: Greenlight," which found its strangest character yet in bath-obsessed director John Gulager;
"How I Met Your Mother," "The Office" and "Everybody Hates Chris," three great hopes for the future of TV comedy;
and the spring seasons of "Survivor" (Tom, Ian and Stephenie) and "The Amazing Race" (Rob and Amber vs. the world), both reality series in top form.
http://www.nj.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/columns-0/113548924710520.xml&coll=1
Best of 2005
Honor roll
By Matthew Zoller Seitz Newark Star-Ledger Sunday, December 25, 2005
The best show of the year? What the #!@*)!! do you think?
My Top 10 list this year should probably carry an asterisk. While there were at least 10 programs, or groups of programs, worth watching every week -- and many more worth checking in on (see my "Honorable Mentions") -- my No. 1 selection, David Milch's HBO western "Deadwood," towered so far above the rest that I was tempted to put every other program in a tie for 10th place. That's not a knock against "Battlestar Galactica," "American Experience" and other formidable titles, just a frank admission that "Deadwood" is not just another program; it's a work of art, the next evolutionary step in series television, and the first drama since "Hill Street Blues" that I feel privileged to have been alive to see. For more evangelizing, read on.
1. "Deadwood" (HBO): After we're all dead and gone and every other program on this list has become an obscure cultural footnote, David Milch's wise, sad, brutal, sensual, linguistically daring, intricately plotted frontier drama will still be watched, analyzed, quoted and treasured. Not merely the greatest dramatic series ever made, but an evolutionary cultural signpost, as significant to television as "Ulysses" was to the novel and "Citizen Kane" to cinema: a work that gathers the medium's accumulated knowledge into one dazzling production, and adds a few innovations of its own. And it's funny, too.
2. "The Comeback" (HBO): The most unpopular, critically slandered and widely misunderstood great series in recent memory, this dark sitcom from producer Michael Patrick King ("Sex and the City") and co-producer-star Lisa Kudrow was cringe TV at its finest, a comic acid bath very few viewers were brave enough (or masochistic enough) to dip into. But the series amounted to more than a weekly display of wanton meanness. Every week it forced us to ask what, exactly, we want from our protagonists, human truth or audience-coddling fantasy. It divided our sympathies as few series dare, asking us to identify with and even cheer Kudrow's character, the ditsy, aging sitcom starlet Valerie Cherish, then letting her scheme, overreach and self-destruct so horribly that our first impulse was to turn away as if shielding our eyes from an obscenity. Like "I Love Lucy," "The Larry Sanders Show," the Canadian classic "More Tears," Steve Coogan's various Alan Partridge programs, and other great comedies that found spectacle in discomfort, "The Comeback" reminded us that comedy is tragedy that's happening to someone else, and that behind every joke, there's a grievance.
3. "Battlestar Galactica" (Sci-Fi): Everytime a new sci-fi series comes on the air, the producers trot out the same tired boilerplate about how theirs isn't a really sci-fi series, but a serious drama that just happens to include sci-fi elements. "Battlestar," now in its second season, is arguably the first high-profile sci-fi show since "Farscape" and the syndicated "Star Trek" series that earns the right to make such lofty claims. In fact -- brace yourself for heresy, kids -- this hard-edged, heavily allegorical series one-ups all preceding sci-fi series by refusing to coddle any of its protagonists in order to make them "relatable." Like 1970s movie heroes, the "Battlestar" crew can be stubborn, deluded, manipulative, childish and dishonest, but the show never cares if you approve; it only asks that you find their behavior believable and interesting, and find cultural, political and theological insight in the series' broad-brushstroke action plots.
4. "American Experience" (PBS): So consistently intelligent and engrossing that one tends to take it for granted, this public TV war-horse had one of its best years ever, airing original and insightful looks at the moon race, the 1927 Louisiana flood, country music's legendary Carter family and the history and cultural significance of Las Vegas.
5. "Veronica Mars" (UPN): If "Deadwood" is a weekly symphony, each episode of the high school gumshoe series "Veronica" is like a new single by a beloved bunch of garage band rockers: three chords plus guts. Alternately smart-alecky, morose, absurd, soapy and politically aware (if the show cared any more about class, its actors would have to start speaking in English accents), it's the most serious fun show on TV.
6. "American Masters" (PBS): The veteran arts series mounted a 20th season that ranked with its very best. There were thorough, lively looks at Ernest Hemingway, Lucille Ball, Samuel Goldwyn, Hank Williams, Willa Cather and Ralph Ellison. And there was a four hour epic on Bob Dylan, directed by Martin Scorsese, that did double-duty as a psychologically astute biography of Dylan and a revealing analysis of how young performers create fresh styles and personas by combining early influences -- a subject that arguably only an artist of Scorsese's stature could have explored with such empathy and exactness.
7. "Frontline" and "Frontline World" (PBS): This year, topics included the evolution of Christianity, the secret history of credit cards, the ethics of torture, the blight of prostitution in India, the effect of global warming on the South Pacific, the historical aftershocks of the O.J. Simpson verdict, a portrait of the Bush administration's photo op mastermind Karl Rove and multiple hours on the Iraq war, the War on Terror and the painful, ongoing complexities of Mideast politics. These two sister series aren't just doing consistently outstanding news reports; at times they seem to be single-handedly propping up a tradition of sober-minded inquiry that's all but vanished from network TV news.
8. "Adult Swim" (Cartoon Network): Why put this programming bloc on the list? First, because it's more surprising, daring and funny than any other regular programming bloc on commercial TV, and second, because it offers some of the most formally daring pop art you'll see anywhere on TV. From established freakshows like "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" and "Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law" to repeats of "Futurama" and "Family Guy" to new additions "12 Oz. Mouse" and "The Boondocks," there isn't a single program that doesn't prompt a visceral reaction, everything from "Genius!" to "That's the dumbest thing I've ever seen." (And yes, sometimes both.)
9. "Weeds" (Showtime): Just when you thought seriocomic looks at suburban life had nothing new to say (cough cough, "Desperate Housewives"), along comes this Showtime series about a widowed suburban pot dealer and her ever-growing client list, which plays like "Goodfellas" meets "thirtysomething." Refreshingly, this series doesn't bother ripping the façade from suburban life because it knows there hasn't been a façade in decades -- just a jumbled community full of quirky individuals balancing responsibility with desire, and doing whatever gets them though the night.
10. Jack's Big Music Show" (Noggin): Imagine a cross between "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood," "The Muppet Show" and Leonard Bernstein's "Young People's Concerts," and you sense the appeal of this brilliantly simple new children's series, which goes beyond stale pronouncements about the history and creation of popular music, and actually breaks it down in terms that even preschoolers can grasp.
Honorable mentions
To "Lost" (ABC), for being passionate, thrilling and eerie even when it's repeating itself and yanking our chain;
"Nightline" (ABC), for letting departing host Ted Koppel go out with freedom and dignity, and revamping the format without sacrificing seriousness;
"The Daily Show" (Comedy Central) for combining news, satire, media criticism and avant-garde conceptual humor;
"The Colbert Report" (Comedy Central), for daring to give a brilliant clown four shows a week to play around with;
"Unscripted" (HBO), "Forty Deuce" (Bravo) and "Project Greenlight" (Bravo) for their insight into the creative process and their merciless depiction of the artist's life;
"Sometimes in April" (HBO) and [FONT=ARIAL BLACK][COLOR=red] "Yesterday" (HBO), for dramatizing recent African tragedies with grace and power; and
"Rescue Me" (FX), for its rambunctious slapstick, droll banter and fearless acting.
http://www.nj.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/columns-0/113548922410520.xml&coll=1
Critic’s Notebook
One Commercial More
By John Eggerton bcbeat.com
"Roast em' on an open fire" my nine year old daughter, Virginia, said to me. So here goes.
I was watching Cartoon Network Christmas Eve with my kids because I love Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol so much that I am willing to sit through commercials every five minutes to hear the songs "Hand for Each Hand" or Lord's Bright Blessing." It really is marvelous television and the best musical setting of the Carol ever. Period. Bar None. End of Discussion.
I appreciate that Cartoon's "Christmas Rush" marathon is a commercial venture more than a gift to my kids, but the rush was mostly about the endless ads than the shows sandwiched between them, so much so that even my kids noticed it.
But there's was low dudgeon compared to mine when they cut the beautiful Julie Styne song, The Winter Was Warm, to shoehorn in a promo for all the other Christmas shows they were going to pepper with so many ads and promos that continuity was as distant a dream as peace on earth.
How about a Christmas Eve marathon where the present to kids is far fewer ads? I know, that is like asking retailers to close down the week before Christmas to allow their employees to volunteer for the homeless. Nice idea, but impractical.
So, thanks for the Carol, but I could have done with a couple more verses.
http://www.bcbeat.com/
Best of 2005: The Characters
Lies and the Lying Doctors and Cons Who Tell Them
By Virginia Heffernan The New York Times December 25, 2005
GREGORY HOUSE ('HOUSE') Fox's great diagnostician contends that everybody lies; he was lying when he said that. The writing is witty here, and the English comic Hugh Laurie, as a jerky pill-popping genius, is among few television actors who can sell those scary things called witticisms.
T-BAG ('PRISON BREAK') A white supremacist who likes to initiate a new convict into the ways of the big house with a welcoming rape, Robert Knepper's Theodore Bagwell is the most depraved of the would-be prison-breakers. He's also adroit at fake penance, as when he seemed to surrender to Abruzzi, only to rise up and slit his throat. The most "Oz"-like of the inmates, T-Bag keeps "Prison Break" rough - and prevents the Fox show from getting too "Shawshank."
ARI GOLD ('ENTOURAGE') He's so smug, you almost don't want to give it to him. But Jeremy Piven's devil agent, as he rose and fell, stole the show this season on "Entourage": the MySpace generation gets its own Gordon Gekko.
SUSIE GREENE ('CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM') She's as bothersome as Larry, and far more vulgar, but - ingeniously - she hoards the moral authority on this show. Nobody plays the suspicious, carping Best Friend's Wife like Susie Essman.
KRISTIN ('LAGUNA BEACH: THE REAL ORANGE COUNTY') Eve Harrington in the O.C. This season, Kristin - a real™ person, according to MTV - trounced her rival, Lauren, and seized the narration of the molten-looking teenage reality series. Something in her feral jockiness made her a male fantasy, and the beach boys pined.
CHRISTIAN TROY ('NIP/TUCK') First, do harm. On FX's drama of highly paid slashwork, the bad doctor Troy is beauty's apostle and its victim. And as the killer Carver says, beauty is a curse upon the world. Understand? Julian McMahon, as Christian the womanizer, is the master of the show's portentous palaver and grim fun.
JOHN LOCKE ('LOST') This onetime paraplegic has become a philosopher king on the enchanted island of "Lost." This season, Terry O'Quinn's Locke went down his precious hatch at last - and a bullet seemed to bounce off his temple. He'd better be invincible: Mr. O'Quinn is the ranking actor here, and Locke's the sober scoutmaster to the rowdy kids of the ill-fated fuselage.
NANCY BOTWIN ('WEEDS') Television's most interesting drug dealer is no longer on "The Wire." Instead, she's nicey Nancy of Agrestic, Calif., a lovely and convenient planned community for families. To the role of pot-lady amid the ticky-tack, Mary-Louise Parker brings both sweetness and spiritual exhaustion.
AL SWEARENGEN ('DEADWOOD') The foul-mouthed Deadwood boss, has made an art of delivering his most turbulent, virtuoso monologues while receiving oral sex. It's that kind of show. And Ian McShane - florid, roiling and grandiose as Swearengen, HBO's Melvillean antihero - is the id of the id.
TYRA BANKS ('AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL') She's only superficially girlfriendy; what makes Tyra a great character are her Solomonic verdicts on beauty and ferocity. Forget (of course) "You're fired." Tyra can make the most cumbersome tagline in television history - "You're still in the running towards becoming America's next top model" - sound fierce.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/arts/television/25heff.html?pagewanted=print
Best of 2005
Gold Watches
Entertainment Weekly
Here’s what made our list of 2005's best moments on ''American Idol,'' ''The Apprentice,'' and other shows in our weekly TV Watch.
10. On American Idol, Bo sings an a cappella version of ''In a Dream'' ''Bo's decision to toss caution — and backing instruments — to the wind paid off more than I'd have ever expected, as the Alabama native showed off his ability not only to hit listeners' guts but also to hit even the trickiest notes with total authority. Much like Fantasia's season 3 'Summertime,' it was the kind of star-making turn that renders the results of the competition irrelevant for Mr. Bice.'' —Michael Slezak
9. On 24, tech nerd Chloe discovers her inner action heroine and blows away some bad guys ''24 has never been the most progressive of TV shows when it comes to women, and giving them weapons and letting them pump a few rounds of lead isn't the most creative way to render them 'strong.' But as a general rule, snarky computer analysts with mousy looks and Big Ass Guns totally rock!!'' —Jeff Jensen
8. On Dancing With the Stars, Kelly Monaco nearly loses the top half of her dress, mid-dance .. I predicted a wardrobe malfunction for the sultry soap star, so it only took me a few seconds to recognize what was happening when she began clutching her breasts at inappropriate moments midway through her 'Bailamos' samba. Now, normally, I wouldn't recommend that judges hand out 8s and 9s to a dancer just for keeping her top on, but in this case Monaco seriously earned her applause.'' —MS
7. Survivor: Guatemala The guys get violently ill ''The Nakúm tribe won and received a flint and the superior camp, but then Blake starting puking his guts out. Or was it Jim? Or was it Judd? Oh, right — it was all three! But even that barforama was tame compared with Bobby Jon, who I honestly thought for a split second might go and die on us. That whole eyes-rolling-back-in-his-head thing was eerie.'' —Dalton Ross
6. Praying all the way, good guys Uchenna and Joyce edge out the sneaky (and already rich) Rob and Amber in the season finale of The Amazing Race ''The idea of someone really thinking God might invest anything in deciding who wins a reality show seems a bastardization of religion. And yet with this one ending so moralistically, I thought just maybe God had something to do with it. I mean, if I were God, I'd certainly think, 'I usually don't get involved, but if Uchenna and Joyce don't win this, then I'm really a douchebag.''' —Josh Wolk
5. Narm! On Six Feet Under, Nate suffers a post-adultery seizure ''As vital as Nate has been to Six Feet Under throughout its five seasons, is there anyone out there who'd be all that sad to see him reach his final destination? Especially after his completely unforgivable decision to sleep with, as his pregnant wife so eloquently put it, 'that sappy little ferret Maggie.' Or the way he repeatedly referred to his unborn daughter with the kind of detachment you'd expect in a discussion about, oh, which type of can opener you ought to buy in the kitchen aisle at the local Target.'' —MS
4. On Desperate Housewives, Bree changes Rex's tie in the coffin at his funeral ''The she-devil was in the details — and the pitch-perfect performance of the incomparable Marcia Cross. The hilarity and the credibility of Bree's wordless transformation from heartbroken widow to borderline psychopath could've easily been derailed if, say, Rex's prep-school tie hadn't been quite so orange, or so hideously adorned with that blasted crest. Or if the episode's director hadn't allowed the camera to linger on Bree as she propped her late husband's torso upward as casually as one might, say, fold an airplane seat table. Or if Cross's body language and facial expression hadn't been so marvelously hungry as Bree scanned the throat of every man in the church for the perfect pinch-hitting accessory.'' —MS
3. On Britney and Kevin: Chaotic, Ms. Spears provides videotaped evidence of how one pair of body parts resembles another: ''She focused the camera on her knees and said, 'They look just like boobs. But they're not. They're my knees!' and then shrieked with laughter. One wonders, what about this intensely banal moment made her tell her editors to include it in the show? You could start by blaming an askew perspective conditioned by a short lifetime spent surrounded by parasitic giggling hairstylists and publicists to whom she only has to say, 'Milk, milk, lemonade, round the corner, fudge is made,' and they'll crap their pants laughing. And yet, Tom Hanks probably gets his ass kissed wherever he goes, but you don't see him making a TV show where he plays the game 'Earlobes or testicles?' '' —JW
2. On Lost, Shannon is shot by Ana Lucia after following a vision of Walt into the jungle ''As my friend Liz pointed out, Shannon engaged in some high-risk behavior this episode: She had sex with Sayid and later declared her love for him. She was redeemed by her sad flashbacks (in which her dad dies and her Wicked Stepmom attempts to crush her ballerina dreams). Then she went running through the jungle in the rain. 'And she didn't listen to Creepy Wet Walt! Creepy Wet Walt told her to shut up. She didn't listen, and she went screaming off towards him. People who don't listen to Creepy Wet Walt... are dumb.''' —Scott Brown
1. On the season finale of The Apprentice, winner Randal rejects Donald Trump's suggestion to also hire runner-up Rebecca: ''There it was. The moment of truth. The time for Randal to step up and do a very gentlemanly thing. But his response was, 'No, Mr. Trump. It's not called The Apprenti. There should only be one.' And to light boos from the audience and quite the look of surprise on Trump's face, that was how we ended. Randal gets a job. And then given the chance to hire the extraordinarily smart and competent Rebecca, he falls, blazing, onto the sword of his tragic, tragic pride.'' —Whitney Pastorek
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/commentary/0,6115,1143898_3_0_,00.html
Best of 2005
Gold Watches
Entertainment Weekly
9. On 24, tech nerd Chloe discovers her inner action heroine and blows away some bad guys ''24 has never been the most progressive of TV shows when it comes to women, and giving them weapons and letting them pump a few rounds of lead isn't the most creative way to render them 'strong.' But as a general rule, snarky computer analysts with mousy looks and Big Ass Guns totally rock!!'' —Jeff Jensen
That was definitely a scream out loud, "Yeah, Chloe!!" scene, without a doubt a 24 classic.
Thanks for all these favorites lists, it's nice to be reminded of a lot of the very, very good TV that was on this year.
It's good to see that more and more folks are really starting to "get it" when it comes to what Battlestar Galactica is really all about.
P.S. Can't wait until Jan 15, The Jack Bauer Power Hour is back!!! :) :D
I agree Jim, but I am usually a bit dismayed at how elitist these lists tend to be.
So many of the critics seemingly wouldn't caught dead enjoying anything their fellow critics might chide them about -- or that millions of Americans seem to like.
But every once in a while one of them lets something slip -- that is what makes it fun for me to read (and post) them all.
What – or Who -- Would You Pick?
The “Hot Off The Press” Best of 2005
It is the end of the year, and the TV columnists have been busy putting together their best and worst lists of 2005. But why should they have all the fun? Let’s join them. So, please post your favorites in the following categories:
Favorite three new network prime-time shows which debuted in anytime in 2005:
Medium
Grey's Anatomy
My Name is Earl
Favorite three new prime-time cable shows:
Extras
Weeds
Unscripted
YFavorite three veteran prime-time shows:
Lost
24
Arrested Development
Favorite three veteran cable prime-time shows:
Sopranos
Six Feet Under
Entourage
Favorite three TV actors:
James Gandolfini
Michael Imperioli
Jason Bateman
YFavorite three TV actresses:
Kristen Bell
Rachel Bilson
Mädchen Amick
Favorite TV sports production:
The Masters
Favorite TV news program or (cable net) as the case may be:
Hannity & Combs
Show the critics most overlook:
King of Queens
Show the critics most over-hype:
Commander In Chief
Actor who makes you cringe
none
Actress who makes you cringe
Geena Davis
One former favorite which has lost your interest this season:
(TIE) Desperate Housewives / Two and a Half Men
(For HD viewers only) Favorite program to show off your HD setup to friends and neighbors:
Lost
(For HD viewers only) Is there any show you enjoy so much you'd watch it even in SD?
Veronica Mars (local UPN doesn't broadcast HD)
Thanks Fred for making this TV season so much fun.
DoubleDAZ
12-26-05, 09:38 AM
Thanks Fred for making this TV season so much fun.Ditto here! I joined this thread really late, but it sure has been entertaining and informative. It's now the first one I read at least 3 times a day; before work, after work, and before bed (and a lot of other times in between work and bed).
Sports On TV
Final 'Monday Night Football' tonight
The party's over after tonight for ABC and its 36 years of 'Monday Night Football”
Dave Darling Orlando Sentinel Staff Writer December 26, 2005
They said it would never work.
The NFL in prime time?
Come on. In 1970, ABC would stand a better chance of putting water in a bottle and trying to sell it.
After all, who would possibly want to watch the NFL at night when you could be watching Here's Lucy, The Doris Day Show or Laugh-In? There simply was no room for professional football in the mix. The NFL was meant to be played on Sunday. . . . during the day.
That is, until Commissioner Pete Rozelle and ABC Sports President Roone Arledge came up with the bold idea to put the NFL on the air every Monday night.
Arledge's dream was to create an "entertainment spectacle." His vision included doubling the number of cameras (to six), putting three broadcasters together in the booth and making extensive use of a relatively new technology called "instant replay."
Critics saw it as a desperate move by a struggling network. Others saw it as ingenious.
"I thought it was a good idea because pro football really had a lot of momentum at the time," said Frank Gifford, who worked Monday night games for ABC for 27 seasons. "ABC really had nothing to lose."
So on Sept. 21, 1970, the Cleveland Browns and the New York Jets took to the field on a sultry night at Municipal Stadium for what would be the first of 557 Monday Night Football games on ABC.
Don-don-don-dah!
And Monday Night Football became an overnight sensation. . . . a cultural phenomenon.
For 36 years it has provided a playoff atmosphere every week.
For 36 years it has been center stage for the game's greatest stars.
For 36 years, it has extended our NFL weekend one more day.
Tonight, ABC will televise its final MNF game. Beginning next season, the games shift to sister network ESPN.
"It was talked about everywhere," said Gifford, who joined Howard Cosell and Don Meredith in the booth in 1971 as MNF's play-by-play announcer. "It wasn't just a game. It was an event."
Indeed, Monday Night Football has become a piece of Americana.
The original prime-time reality show is the second-longest running nighttime show behind 60 Minutes.
It came long before the days of ESPN and 24-hour-a-day sports networks, altering the sports-programming schedule forever. Soon the World Series would be in prime time and the Olympics would move to night hours for good.
"It really got the ball rolling in that direction," Gifford said. "People didn't expect us to do well. But ABC ended up owning Monday nights and it led to more prime-time sports."
Tonight, ABC turns out the lights for the final time.
At long last, the party's over.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/entertainment/tv/orl-mnf2605dec26,0,2363044,print.story?coll=orl-caltvtop
Sports On TV
Turn out the lights
The party's over for 'Monday Night Football' on ABC after a 36-year run as the show that became a part of pop culture moves to ESPN in 2006
By Bob Hohler The Boston Globe Staff December 26, 2005
A casket bearing the bombastic pundit who revolutionized television sports broadcasting and helped alter American pop culture with his provocative role on ABC's ''Monday Night Football" rests in a New York cemetery beneath a headstone etched with a passage from the poem, ''Ode to a Nightingale."
''My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains my sense," reads Howard Cosell's epitaph.
Cosell recited the line during a ''Monday Night Football" game 25 years ago as he broke the news of John Lennon's murder and helped the nation confront its grief.
Sometime late tonight, ABC's ''Monday Night Football" also shall pass. After 36 seasons as one of the brightest stars in the galaxy of sports broadcasting -- a reign rich in innovation, inanity, and indelible memories -- the second-longest-running program in prime-time history will expire moments after the scoreboard clock at Giants Stadium runs out on a game between the Patriots and New York Jets.
Cause of death: Sagging ratings, financial losses, and a drowsy numbness that has seeped into the broadcast since Cosell's heyday in the announcer's booth with Frank Gifford and ''Dandy" Don Meredith. The program, eclipsed in prime-time longevity only by CBS's ''60 Minutes," is scheduled to begin a new incarnation next year before a smaller audience on ESPN.
''It was an event that defined a country's culture," said former Patriot Russ Francis, whose fame the Monday night broadcast wildly enhanced. ''Wherever I go in the world -- Morocco, Korea, Germany -- when people find out I played American football, they say, 'Monday Night Football.' It will be sad to see it go."
When the show debuted in 1970, television viewers had never seen anything like it. NFL games became a springboard for such a wacky celebration of sport and society that when the Patriots hosted their first Monday night contest, they hired a stuntman, Jumpin' Joe Gerlach, to plunge out of a hot air balloon.
''I thought, 'This is 'Monday Night Football,' if I ever saw it,' " said Upton Bell, then the Patriots' general manager. ''The show was more than a game. It was an entertainment product. The only thing missing was Cecil B. DeMille."
Gerlach, a former Olympic high diver, plummeted through a strong crosswind toward a small mat in Schaefer Stadium Nov. 6, 1972, as the Patriots and Colts prepared to open the second half. On impact, Gerlach ignited an explosive device, then lay motionless for several seconds amid a cloud of smoke and an eerie silence. Finally, he sprang to his feet.
''It was the highlight of the game," Bell said. ''They kept showing replays, with Cosell asking Meredith, 'What do you think of that, Danderoo?' "
At first, the broadcast venture itself seemed as risky as Gerlach's dive. ABC reluctantly agreed to air the show only after CBS opted to stick with its Monday night hits, ''The Doris Day Show" and ''Here's Lucy," and NBC chose to continue riding its ratings bonanza, ''Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In."
Yet ABC concocted a formula for the show that both pioneered regular sports programming in prime time and created a ratings juggernaut. The trick was pairing Cosell, a brash, ''tell-it-like-it-is" commentator, with Meredith, a quick-witted, twangy Texan and former Pro Bowl quarterback. Meredith's musings (''Isn't Fair Hooker a great name?" he wondered aloud of a Cleveland receiver) balanced Cosell's biting monologues, while Gifford provided the play-by-play -- and a calming influence.
''People remember Don being a country bumpkin, which he wasn't, and Howard being a pain in the , which he was," Gifford said. ''I was the law and order."
[B]Star-studded affair
The television universe in 1970 was limited to little more than three major networks. Only 7 percent of American homes received basic cable, and nine years would pass before ESPN hit the airwaves. So, when ABC rolled out a slickly produced, prime-time football show with a trio of announcers who broke the mold of their traditionally reverential predecessors, male viewers led the stampede to the program.
'' 'Monday Night Football' served as an ambassador for the sport, bringing in a lot of nonfootball fans and helping the league leapfrog the other sports on television," said Randy Vataha, a Patriots receiver in the 1970s who now serves as president of Boston-based Game Plan LLC. ''It was the best marketing tool the NFL ever had."
The show became a celebrity magnet for the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Placido Domingo, Burt Reynolds, John Denver . . . and Kermit the Frog.
The most fascinating episode, however, involved Lennon and President Ronald Reagan, then governor of California. Each figure embodied part of the cultural divide of the time, Lennon the protesting pacifist pop star, Reagan the hard-line conservative leader. Gifford had invited them to appear on the same show in the early '70s, assuming Lennon would be a no-show.
To Gifford's surprise, he looked over his shoulder during the broadcast and spotted the two waiting together.
''Governor Reagan had his arm around John Lennon and he was explaining American football to him," Gifford said. ''Only on 'Monday Night Football' would you get those two guys, who were poles apart, united."
Their appearance prompted some swift maneuvering by Cosell, who initially planned to interview Reagan but anticipated the audience's keener interest in Lennon.
''Giffer," Gifford recalled Cosell abruptly stating, ''you take the governor and I'll take the Beatle."
Meredith, who was not available for an interview, described the program in those days as ''Mother Love's Traveling Freak Show." He had started a broadcast in Denver by saying, ''Welcome to the Mile High City, and I really am." And he projected a similar image near the end of most lopsided contests when he crooned, ''Turn out the lights, the party's over."
Wherever they went, Cosell and crew were treated like rock stars. Mayors doled out keys to their cities. Autograph-seekers swarmed them. Newspapers and television stations reported on their arrivals, their itineraries, their performances.
''They were the Mick Jagger and U2 of their time," Bell said.
Until the end, Cosell was a lightning rod, revered by countless viewers, reviled by countless others. His grandson, Colin Cosell, said Cosell's daughter, Jill, sometimes watched until the final minute of every broadcast to be sure no one tried to carry out one of the numerous threats on her father's life.
''He constantly received death threats, either because he was Jewish or people disagreed with his opinions or just got fed up with his nasally voice," said Colin, whose birth Cosell announced on the show in 1979. ''But, for all his faults, he stuck to his guns and told it like it was."
Francis once irked Cosell by asking him to drop the nickname Cosell had created and had helped make Francis famous: ''All-World." Francis tried telling Cosell his football brethren, including his teammates, so resented the nickname they ''wanted me dead."
''Listen to me and listen to me carefully, No. 81," Francis recalled an angry Cosell saying. ''Get tough or get out -- quick."
Cosell later asked Francis to baby-sit his grandchildren at a hotel pool while Cosell attended a pregame production meeting. The request led to trouble when Cosell returned so late that Francis missed a Patriots meeting, incurring the wrath of coach Chuck Fairbanks.
''What are you doing splashing around in the pool with these critters?" Fairbanks barked, according to Francis. ''Get your fanny in the meeting now."
Not until Cosell's funeral in 1995 did Francis learn that Cosell had paid the fine Fairbanks planned to impose on Francis.
''People talk about what a blowhard he was," Francis said, ''but he was a fine gentleman."
Personality changes
In one of the most poignant moments on ''Monday Night Football," Cosell helped pay tribute in 1979 to Francis's former roommate, Darryl Stingley, when Stingley returned for the first time to Foxborough after Raiders safety Jack Tatum rocked him a year earlier in Oakland, leaving him a quadriplegic. The crowd gave Stingley a seven-minute ovation, twice preventing the game from resuming.
''I spent a lot of time before then dealing with the demons -- the whys and what-fors," Stingley said in a phone interview from Chicago. ''But the people were so overwhelming in their support that night, it was truly the launching pad that sent me back out into the world."
As for Cosell, Stingley said, ''I had heard so many negative things about him, but I found him to be genuine in his compassion. I'll never forget him for that."
In an ironic twist, Cosell's reign on Monday nights ended not long after he described a play involving Redskins receiver Alvin Garrett in 1983 by saying, ''Look at that little monkey go."
An outspoken supporter of civil rights, Cosell said he would have used the same term to describe a white player. Many black leaders also defended him. But Cosell did not return for the '84 season, and the program never reclaimed its ratings dominance, despite consistently ranking among the top network programs through this season.
''It's still part of American culture, but back in those days it was a prime-time spectacular," said Bill Fine, president and general manager of Channel 5, Boston's ABC affiliate. ''Back then, it was much more of an event for the nation."
Meredith lasted one season after Cosell's departure. Gifford stayed until 1997, a 27-year run in which he worked with 11 on-air personalities, including Al Michaels, O.J. Simpson, Joe Namath, and Lesley Visser, the former Boston Globe sportswriter who became the first of five women sideline reporters on ''Monday Night Football."
While the program lost much of its original pizzazz -- particularly when the curtain fell on the halftime highlights Cosell narrated as if they were footage from a battlefront -- the crews that followed Cosell and Meredith managed to mix some humor with their weekly football feast. Visser, for example, once teased Michaels about his obsession with special prosecutor Kenneth Starr's inquiry into President Bill Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky.
After interviewing former Packer great Bart Starr during a game in Green Bay, Visser threw the broadcast back to Michaels by saying, ''There you have it, Al, the Starr report."
By the mid-1980s, ''Monday Night Football" began to steadily decline in the ratings, ultimately prompting ABC to take another risk in 2000 by tossing comedian Dennis Miller into the booth with Michaels and retired quarterback Dan Fouts. Miller and Fouts lasted only two seasons before ABC pared its three-man crew in the booth to two, Michaels and John Madden.
''The show became a game of musical chairs, with a lot of failed on-air experiments," Colin Cosell said.
The final bow
In recent years, the once-mighty broadcast continued to rank among the top 10 prime-time programs but began lagging behind a head-to-head competitor, ''Everybody Loves Raymond." Cable television's array of viewing options increasingly sapped the show of its ratings clout, and even Gifford stopped watching every game (he said he missed last Monday's).
''MNF is like virtually everything in traditional media, weakened by the explosion of technology and the fractionalization of the media landscape," said Tim Spengler, executive vice president and director of national broadcast for Initiative, one of the nation's top ad-buying firms.
Gifford, who plans to attend tonight's game, said he initially persuaded Meredith to join him. But Meredith, who cherishes his privacy, reneged, instead agreeing to appear in taped segments from his home in New Mexico.
''I told him to take off the freaking cowboy hat and the dark glasses and nobody would recognize him," Gifford said. ''But I guess he feels less of an obligation to be there than I do."
Michaels and Madden will work the broadcast together for the last time, as Michaels prepares to move to ESPN with the Monday night crew and Madden joins NBC for a new Sunday night football game. (Joe Theismann, the former Redskins quarterback who suffered a memorable career-ending injury on ''Monday Night Football" in 1985, will replace Madden on Monday nights.)
Disney, which owns both ABC and ESPN, has scheduled a party at 2 a.m., after tonight's broadcast. Revelers will toast one of the craziest adventures in sports broadcasting, a national phenomenon that began when the (Boston) Patriots played their home games at Harvard Stadium, Bill Belichick was an 18-year-old senior at Phillips Academy in Andover, and gas was 36 cents a gallon.
The Disney execs still believe so deeply in Monday night football that they paid the NFL $1.1 billion a year over the next eight years to broadcast the games on ESPN, double the price of ABC's final contract. But no one expects either the new ESPN or NBC broadcast to generate the buzz Cosell and Co. once created.
''Unless your team is playing in it, it may be just another game," said Jason Mittell, a professor of media studies at Middlebury College. ''I have a hard time imagining it will become as iconic as [ABC's] 'Monday Night Football.' "
http://www.boston.com/sports/articles/2005/12/26/turn_out_the_lights?mode=PF
Sports On TV
20 Years Later, Theismann Revisits Replay
By Richard Sandomir The New York Times December 26, 2005
ASHBURN, Va., Dec. 22 - It was one of the ghastliest sports injuries captured on television, and Joe Theismann had spent 20 years avoiding the replay. He would turn his head if clips were being shown of the tackle by Lawrence Taylor that snapped his right leg during ABC's broadcast of "Monday Night Football."
Although he initially agreed to watch a tape of that Giants-Redskins game with a reporter, Theismann then resisted. "Why would I want to watch that?" he said. But after a break, he returned to a viewing room in the Redskins' complex, where he works out and is a regular visitor.
"O.K.," he said, sounding nearly eager to see the play that ended his playing career. "Let's do this. It's been long enough."
Theismann's belated reminiscence came four days before ABC's "Monday Night" finale - the Patriots against the Jets at Giants Stadium - after 36 seasons. ABC has two wild-card playoff games and the Super Bowl left, but the Monday night games will shift next year to ESPN, for whom Theismann has called Sunday night games since 1988. He will call "Monday Night" with Al Michaels, the show's play-by-play voice for 20 years.
"I wanted to continue to do television," Theismann said. "The only viable option for me was 'Monday Night.' "
As he watched the game that turned him into a sportscaster, he recalled that he was inconsistent that season. He was throwing too many interceptions. "I was in a funk," he said, then remembered how in training camp he boasted that he would play until he had to be carried from the field.
As he watched video of his 36-year-old self from Nov. 18, 1985, he said he had thought that would be the game that would reverse his luck.
He watched as he fired a sharp pass to Gary Clark.
"See," he said. "That's the way I should have played all year."
He watched as he was sacked by Leonard Marshall.
"Stupid decision," he said. "I should have thrown that ball away."
He protested a pass-interference penalty against the Redskins.
"No!" he said from his leather swivel chair. "Bad call!"
Frank Gifford, Joe Namath and O. J. Simpson were in the booth. Ten months earlier, in January, Theismann called the Super Bowl with Gifford and Don Meredith, as ABC Sports relegated Simpson to pregame duties.
Now, as the moment that ended his playing career neared, Theismann said: "I'm getting butterflies. It's like you know something's coming."
The second quarter began with a short run by John Riggins for a Washington first down to the Redskins' 46.
One play away. "This is funny," he said. "My heart's racing."
The flea-flicker: Theismann handed off to Riggins, who pitched it back to him, but Theismann could find no open receivers. He was trapped. Giants linebacker Harry Carson grazed Theismann with his right hand. Then Taylor jumped and grabbed Theismann's lightly padded shoulders. Taylor's momentum caused his body to swing under Theismann's torso; his knee landed with a missile's impact on Theismann's lower right leg.
ABC's live angle showed little, but Gifford took note of the gravity conveyed by Taylor's fervent waving for help. But a reverse angle, taken from the 50, revealed the grisly twisting of the leg. Looking through his camera from the opposite side of the field, Jack Cronin knew he had witnessed something dreadful. He alerted Chet Forte, ABC's director. "I think someone should look at the tape," Cronin said he told Forte. "I think he broke his leg. And they said, 'Oh, man.' "
Tommy O'Connell, another cameraman, said he heard Forte say that the shot was too gruesome to be replayed.
Bob Goodrich, the producer, said it was the worst injury he had seen. He said in an interview that he told the announcers: " 'Guys, this is ugly.' We knew we had to be careful."
But despite the misgivings, ABC rolled the replay. Simpson or Namath groaned.
They all knew the sound of snapped bones, Gifford said.
"Oh," Theismann said. His eyes closed a bit. He winced: the jolting voltage of memory. "You could hear it," he said, referring to the cracking of his tibia; his fibula was broken, too. "The pain was unbelievable."
"Oh, God," he said. "Wow. It just went so suddenly. It snapped like a breadstick. It sounded like two muzzled gunshots off my left shoulder. Pow, pow!" Then, he said, his endorphins kicked in and he felt no pain.
Paul Maguire, the partner of Theismann and Mike Patrick on ESPN's Sunday night telecasts since 1998, was watching. "It was a hell of a hit," Maguire said last week. "Over the years, we've shown it on the air, but I don't know what he does. I'm not looking at him."
Jay Rothman, the producer of ESPN's Sunday night N.F.L. telecasts, said the spectacle of the injury only partly defined Theismann. "He was a great little field general, and that in his mind is what defines him," he said. "He looks at it as a hell of a career that unfortunately got shortened."
While ABC was in a commercial break after the first replay, a camera zeroed in on Theismann; there was blood around his shin. "That was not something people wanted to see, especially if kids were watching," Goodrich recalled thinking. On the air, Gifford reported what was seen by the camera and warned that another replay was coming. "If your stomach is weak," Gifford said, "just don't watch."
Theismann's face was turning away as it repeated his horror.
"How many times do I have to watch this?" he said quietly.
Then, he turned away, but not far enough to avoid seeing it.
He recalled being lucid and hearing the team's orthopedic surgeon tell him that he had reset the tibia on the field. He could be seen speaking. Eventually, six men carried him off on a gurney; an ABC handheld camera showed them bringing him to a dimly lit area under the stands at R.F.K. Stadium.
On the field, Jay Schroeder replaced Theismann. In the third quarter, ABC showed the replay for the third and final time. Gifford repeated his caution to viewers with weak stomachs.
The Redskins won, 23-21.
Now Theismann looked relieved. He had finally seen the play, not just a photograph, but the full sequence, from the start of the flea-flicker to the mangling of his leg, which, after healing, is a little shorter than his left.
He said it was not as bad as he imagined, or as graphic as people told him. "It was so quick and so sudden," he said. "I didn't feel a twinge in my leg, but I felt butterflies. If the technology available now was available then, it would have been incredibly more graphic."
Now, the circuit is complete. Theismann called his first football game with the "Monday Night" crew. Then his career expired on "Monday Night."
Now he will call "Monday Night."
" 'Monday Night' is a stage where everybody watches," Theismann said. "It's more than a game, it's an event."
As much as anyone, he would know.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/26/sports/football/26monday.html?pagewanted=print
Sports On TV
Clock runs out for 'MNF'
By David Bianculli New York Daily News TV Editor Monday, December 26th, 2005
While every other network this evening is showing reruns, ABC is airing something that's not only original, and live, but the swan song of a TV institution.
"Monday Night Football," after 35 years, is down to its last four quarters starting at 9 p.m.
The predictable, even inevitable signoff, is the country-and-Western lyric "Turn out the lights, the party's over," which Don Meredith used to sing at the first sign of a blowout (often to the annoyance of more serious announcing booth mate Howard Cosell). And Meredith will show up tonight to do just that, and to help open the show - though not, reportedly, in person.
Former Dallas Cowboy quarterback Meredith, and famously abrasive yet talented sportscaster Cosell, were two-thirds of the unprecedentedly crowded booth fielded by ABC executive Roone Arledge for that first game on Sept. 21, 1970. ABC's Keith Jackson was the other - replaced, the following year, by Frank Gifford. They're the troika that made "MNF" must-See TV regardless of which teams were playing.
There was Cosell's eagerly