An archive of articles about US television programmes and production.
I was worrying a while back about the small number of female writers on US TV at the moment. Fortunately, it seems Happy Endings doesn’t have that problem, judging by this video in which star Casey Wilson tries to pitch the writers some plotlines for her character, Penny. The problem they do have appears to be addiction to Diet Coke.
I do love Portlandia. It’s easily the best sketch show of the last few years: a character-based satire of the (apparently) extremely liberal city of Portland, Oregon. The show is coming back in January with some all-new characters, including the Sanitation Twins, who you can see below. Hang around to the end – it’s brilliant.
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British TV
US TV
In the US: Fridays, 10pm ET/PT, Starz
A little while ago, I mocked Starz. To be fair, it’s very deserving of mockery, given Camelot and – gods help us – Torchwood: Miracle Day, just for starters.
But Starz is trying, really trying, not to be the the worst and tackiest of the cable networks when it comes to drama. Even though it shows Spartacus, which while quite good in quite a lot of respects, still has the Starz tacky DNA in every cell of its green-screened, over-developed body.
Yet now, with Boss, they’ve actually got a show that’s very good and only makes you think “Ooh, that’s a bit tacky, isn’t it?” two or three times in its entire hour-long first episode. It stars Kelsey Grammer as the mayor of Chicago and shows in glorious detail why the two things in life you don’t want to see being made are sausages and laws.
Here’s a trailer.
The offspring of my former campaign to get everyone watching The Wire, my never-ending quest to get people watching Southland has had a little boost thanks to the fact that More 4 has started showing season 3 on Thursdays at 9pm (you can watch the first episode on 4oD).
Now season 4 is going to start in the US in January and the network that shows it there, TNT, has put out this video looking back at some of the highlights of season 3. I’ve watched it and there are no real spoilers, so if you want to know if investing time and effort in Southland season 3 will be worth it, here’s chance to find out. And if that whet your appetite, there’s more about season 3 and earlier seasons back here.
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