An archive of articles about US television programmes and production.
Sesame Street does Mad Men
I wonder how many members of the audience got this one?
US TV
Monday’s ratings meltdown news
Film
- Liam Neeson joins The Next Three Days, wears stupid armour in Clash of the Titans
- Disney to downsize Miramax
- Five-minute clip from 2012
Theatre
- Sam Mendes working on a Willy Wonka musical
- Michael Gambon pulls out of Alan Bennett play
- Kelly McGillis to star in Frankie and Johnny?
British TV
- Casting on the Only Fools and Horses prequel
US TV
- BBC offers US TV remakes of Butterflies and Three Up, Two Down
- Mentalist and Fringe drop in the Thursday ratings while…
- …Friday night ratings a disaster, particularly for Smallville and Dollhouse
- Clips and a photo of Paris Hilton in Supernatural
US TV
Review: The Middle 1×1
In the US: Wednesdays, 8.30c/7.30c, ABC
Huh. The Middle. Is there a Malcolm in out there somewhere?
Actually, hold it right there. I was going to go into a big long comparison between this and Malcolm and the Middle, but then I realised this starred Patricia Heaton from Everybody Loves Raymond and Back To You, not Jane Kaczmarek from Malcolm in the Middle. So it all fell apart.
Putting that slight issue to one side, there are some obvious comparisons. We have a slight loser mom married to a regular type, loser dad (Neil Flynn from Scrubs). They have three kids. The youngest kid is a bit strange and looks very much like the youngest kid in Malcolm in the Middle. It’s all about the chaos of family life…
You see? It would have worked so much better with Jane Kaczmarek. Why isn’t she in this to make my life easier?
Actually, The Middle (a reference to Indiana, middle America and the middle class not child) is not quite the same as Malcolm in the Middle, even if the tone is the same. Here the focus is very much on the far more regular parents, doing their level best not to cock up in rearing their children – and the rest of their lives – and failing hopelessly, just as their children are.
How much you enjoy this will therefore depend on whether you have kids – and whether you feel like you’re failing in life.
US TV
Review: Hank 1×1 (US: ABC)
In the US: Wednesdays, 8/7c, ABC
There are plenty of reasons to sorry for Kelsey Grammer. Let’s confine ourselves to the TV ones, though.
He’s been in two of the most popular and best sitcoms in history: Cheers and Frasier. So, everything since has been something of a comedown.
He’s been involved in some truly awful drek since, including Back To You. You’ve got to feel sorry for him for that.
And whatever he’s been in, he’s played a character you’re not exactly supposed to love. In fact, he always plays some pompous twat who has to experience major humiliation with almost every episode.
Now we have Hank, in which Grammer becomes a human piñata for America’s viewing pleasure: a former CEO ousted from his company and forced to downsize in the country. He gets a crap house, a family bitter with him for never being there, and an everyman brother-in-law who takes great pleasure in seeing the misery that Hank now has to endure.
And it’s rubbish.
Poor old Kelsey.
Friday’s sleepy cat news
Film
- Deborah Kara Unger and James Nesbitt join Martin Sheen in The Way
- Daniel Dae Kim and Michael Kelly join The Adjustment Bureau
- New trailer for John Woo’s The Red Cliff
British TV
- E4 acquires Accidentally on Purpose
- Living acquires Cougar Town
- CBS Reality, CBS Action and CBS Drama to launch on 16 November
- STV saves £4.5m by dropping ITV1 programming
- Bagpuss to make a comeback?
US TV
- Hank and The Middle do well for ABC on Wednesday
- Day One cut to just a three-episode mini-series
- Josh Lawson to replace Eric Christian Olsen in Alyssa Milano in Romantically Challenged
- Comedy Central orders adaptation of Boys and Girls Guide to Getting Down
- Two pilots, including Ben Stiller’s The Station, kept alive
- Another attempt to turn Midnighters into a TV series
- Carol Leifer gets two writing projects
- HBO, BBC and Australian Broadcasting Corp to co-produce Angry Boys
- Nick Chinlund joins The Mentalist (spoiler alert)
- Megan Mullally to guest on Parks and Recreation