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TV Snowflakes: I Married Dora

Posted on November 16th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

Each is unique, and never to be repeated. We review obscure gems of TV shows that aired for one season (at most) before getting canceled.

Anybody remember this one? Yeah, me neither. Perfect snowflake.

I Married Dora was here so briefly that I had to do some scouring to uncover the requisite screen grab or promo cast picture. Found one, though! See?

8142 TV Snowflakes: I Married Dora

I Married Dora: Ten points for Ravenclaw if you remember this one. Via

Dora wasn’t significant for its premise, which we’ve seen in approximately forty million romantic movies which may or many not involve Meg Ryan, or possibly Julia Roberts: Somebody needs to marry somebody else to stay in the country. Supposedly hilarious hi jinks ensue.

In the case of Dora, the national guest with the expiring visa was Dora herself, a housekeeper from El Salvador played by Elizabeth Pena. Nothing new here– it was done again with somewhat more success with Fran Drescher in The Nanny, only the titular character was in danger of being dangerously poor rather than deported– but those who do remember this brief blip from 1988 may recall its shocker of a finale.

Slapped up against Beauty and the Beast, the sitcom didn’t offer viewers a viable alternative in the time slot. When the series was cancelled, it said so.

Not via press release or Twitter campaign– that would have to wait for Team Coco’s era– but right through the fourth wall. In the final episode, rather than fading gently into that good snowflake ether, the male lead announced, in character, that the series had been cancelled. Zoom out, end of episode, end of show.

When you gotta go, go mean.

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TV Couch: Yes, There Is an Explanation for Michael Scott

Posted on November 16th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

TV Couch: Pop psych ‘diagnoses’ of which mental disorders TV or reality TV characters suffer from

This has been making the rounds of the Internet lately: If you know someone with, um, too much of a sense of humor, there just might be a biochemical explanation for that.

Witzelsucht, which sounds like some sort of wonderfully powdered dessert, is instead a condition in which the sufferer insists upon making jokes, really bad jokes, in the worst possible circumstances. Which makes every single person around him or her the sufferers.

In other words… Michael Scott.

steve carell TV Couch: Yes, There Is an Explanation for Michael Scott

He’s totally hilarious… in his own mind. Via

Steve Carell’s uniquely horrible boss is so uniquely horrible, it’s tough to imagine the TV world without him.

Although one of the finest examples of character humor in modern television, Michael Scott would make, nonetheless, an absolutely horrible boss, customer, employee, roommate, or boyfriend. Fun to watch, not so much fun to be around.

What makes for good television can also make for horrific company. A recent episode of The Office (DISH 120, NBC, Thursdays, 9 PM EST) traced Michael’s love life, which he admitted was “a freak show.” They ain’t got nothin’ on their ex, one of those “funny” people who amuses the world only in his own mind.

No word on what the treatment for Witzelsucht might be, given that anyone who’s met this guy knows all too well that social conditioning doesn’t working. Missing social cues is part of the smash. But for those who are inflicted by those who are inflicted with Witzelsucht, may I suggest alcohol. Or a previously compiled list of many, many excuses.

Tags: nbc, steve carell, the office, witzelsucht
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The Top Ten Movies Of All Time

Posted on November 12th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

…according to our guest blogger, Water:

water The Top Ten Movies Of All Time

1. Waterworld

I look quite good in it. Also, people walked out of the theater envisioning drinking their own pee, or quite possibly Kevin Costner’s pee, and appreciating me in a clean state enormously.

2. The 10 Commandments

Much of my sea work here was completed by my stunt double, gelatin. But the scene with Yul Brenner and the spreading red tide? All. Me.

3. Jaws

Would rate higher if the stupid shark hadn’t gotten so much undue attention. Also, please note that it’s never safe to go back into me. I have seaweed, and also suckerfish. You have been warned.

4. Water

Okay, so it’s Indian? And I’ve never seen it? And I’m told that it’s not, technically, about water? But the marquee poster is awesome in my bathroom.

5. Titanic

That’ll learn ya to send Leonardo DiCaprio where I can get at him.

6. Psycho

Some of my best work here, if I had to share billing with Fake Blood.

7. Singin’ in the Rain

I do like to turn to musicals occasionally. I am in talks with the Glee people for a 2011 tribute ep, but after the Britney debacle I’m seriously considering calling it off. Anyway, this was a nice break from the seemingly endless supporting role of ice beneath the exponentially increasing weight of Sonja Henie.

8. A River Runs Through It

Personally, I don’t remember much of the shooting of this one; much of it took place just before I entered rehab. It was a very dark time. Still, pretty scenery, and an honor to work with the great Tom Skerritt

9. The Little Mermaid

First of all, crabs don’t look like that. And most of the ones I know are a-holes. Still—nice sun-sparkles in post-production, fun voice work.

10. White Christmas

Due to a contract dispute with Paramount, I did not actually appear in this film, but settled out of court to be represented by potato flakes. We all walked away friends.

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The Age of Conan

Posted on November 10th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

Three hours before Conan O’Brien returned to the airwaves, a countdown clock popped up on TBS before a triumphant red carpet of Family Guy re-runs. Conan (weeknights, 11 PM EST, DISH 139) endlessly pimped on TBS, which superimposed a Conan-style coif over its network icon bug.

conan obrien emmy campaign 2010 The Age of Conan

Have you heard? Via

Conan… that’s the first sign he’s placing himself as a Man of the Facebook People. This is how we mention our shows anyway, isn’t it? Do you actually hear this at the watercooler?

“Hey, did you catch The Tonight Show with Jay Leno last night?”

“No, I was watching Late Night with David Letterman.”

It’s just not how we talk (or, apparently, watch; O’Brien clobbered the competition on his first night out of the Nielsen gate.) They’re in our living rooms or bedrooms night after night; I should hope we’re on a first-name basis. They’re Jay and Dave– Letterman and Leno if you live in a frat. So the nod to how the American lexicon actually operates is refreshing.

Even when that bow to the lexicon is worked into one big “Boy, my former boss…” joke? The first ten minutes consisted of a cold open and NBC-focused monologue (He named the show Conan “so [he'd] be harder to replace!”) There’s acknowledging the elephant in the room, and then there’s focusing a spotlight on his wrinkled, hairy ass. It’s a smart move by O’Brien: He’s never been as popular as when he’s perceived as wrongly fired. True, that “firing” reportedly came with a tens of millions of dollars feel-better. It’s not as if the man has to work.

But it’s perhaps for the good of late night that he’s chosen to do so. On the same night Conan made its bow, Dave Letterman welcomed Harrison Ford (it’s been months, to be honest, since I’ve tuned in to CBS for my late-night entertainment, but… Harrison Ford!) What I saw may be best described as two old farts sitting on the porch of Morrison’s Cafeteria, waiting on their table: Ford, an accomplished pilot, answered a question about his humanitarian work in Haiti by focusing on the minutiae of how he actually got there, and Letterman at one point stopped the proceedings to ask Ford the name of the actor who played Luke Skywalker. Because there are no better uses of Harrison Ford’s presence on a talk-show set. O’Brien, meanwhile, was playing and singing an energetic rockabilly number with guest Jack White.

Most arresting about Conan is its insistence on becoming, perhaps, the first late- night talk show built on a foundation of irony (some might argue that The Daily Show beat him to it, but they have the wrong tenth-grade SAT word. The Daily Show is, in fact, built on a foundation of smugness.) The set looks as if it were teleported in from 1972; his band is re-christened “The Basic Cable Band,” and none of this went unnoticed by second-night guest Tom Hanks, who said, “You have taken the late-night chat-show format and blown it out of the water.”

Still, the best line of the night went to sidekick Andy Richter as he and his boss donned auburn-haired “Former Talk Show Host” Halloween masks.

“It smells like tears,” he announced.

Give him a few months.

Tags: conan, late night
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TV Couch: Sanford, Son, and All Their Crap

Posted on November 9th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

TV Couch: Pop psych ‘diagnoses’ of which mental disorders TV or reality TV characters suffer from

I fully realize that this is coming from a person who recently came across the back- up printer cord cable for the printer she owned about for printers ago, but Americans have learned to hoard early and often.

We saw this in play out in the ’70′s with Sanford and Son. On the surface, Sanford, as well as Son, had excuses; their business was salvage and the general amassing of crap. Said crap, however, followed the proprietors inside the house.

sanfordson105amatterofl TV Couch: Sanford, Son, and All Their Crap It’s a lot of crap, Elizabeth! Via

Much has been made of our “throw- away society,” with now even one- use mops on the market (and if you even think about doing harm to my Swiffer, you will pay.) Everyone with grandparents who survived the Great Depression has terrifying tales of cleaning out basements crammed with polyester checkered pants, corroded car batteries, and sad remains of melted candles. But it improves generationally: My parents hoard less than my grandparents, and I hoard less still than both. Perhaps my nephews’ grandsons will depart for college will the entirety of their belongings in a carry- on bag. Cheap, put-together furniture and rapidly improving techno toys make frequent trips to Goodwill easy.

In a way, much as New York people are constantly claiming that New York is automatically a character in itself whenever a play, movie, TV show, novel, short story, blog post, or hemorrhoid cream commercial is set there, the background junk became part of the show. Sanford and Son explored not only generational issues, but those of race and class as well–just as Fred’s livelihood was all out in the open, so, too, was America’s dirty laundry.

Tags: generations, sanford and son, TV classics, tv couch
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TV Snowflakes: The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien

Posted on November 8th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

Each is unique, and never to be repeated. We review obscure gems of TV shows that aired for one season (at most) before getting canceled.

TV Snowflakes usually focuses on deserved one-seasoners and the occasional undeserving cancellation. And then we have Conan.

The Tonight Show with Conan OBrien2 TV Snowflakes: The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien

“I feel like someone’s staring at me…” Via

First of all, let us stipulate that the title of The Tonight Show should have been retired with Carson. We can all agree on this, can we not? When Tom Brady retires from the Patriots, Tom Brady’s number won’t be used again. There’s a reason for that.

Carson’s Tonight Show on NBC (DISH 245) was an institution, a cultural touchstone; assuming that mantle was such a battle that David Letterman left a network over it. (Seriously, might this have gone any differently if the brass had called it something else? Was that it?) And, later, so did O’Brian– but not of his choice. It kicked off a redeux firestorm on an issue we’d thought settled during the Clinton administration. The story went, somewhat weirdly, international.

While Leno’s form of the program wasn’t necessarily horrible, it served. He was just kind of there, night after night, and then all of a sudden he wasn’t anymore. He’d moved back an hour– but his comfortable viewers didn’t follow him.

O’Brien’s problem is that his viewers were engaged pretty much everywhere but Neilsen boxes. And The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien wasn’t horrible either. It was just mainstream in an era in which mainstream is slowly circling the drain.

When O’Brien’s new venture debuts this week, it will be interesting to see if fans actually translate affection and support into buzz and ratings. His original shot at the traditional 11 PM slot didn’t create any earthquakes, and the next iteration probably won’t either. But his new bosses might well be more patient.

For his sake, we hope so.

Tags: conan, jay leno, nbc, snowflakes, the tonight show
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Zenyatta Yadda Yadda

Posted on November 8th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

Even though I write for the industry, my skills as a horse racing bettor are notoriously bad. I have placed one bet. Which didn’t go so well.

But I still had a sinking feeling as I watched the coverage of the Breeders’ Cup Classic this year, and it certainly wasn’t because I had some kind of inkling that a lot of people were about to buy into a lot of hype. It was because I dreaded what might follow if the hype didn’t deliver.

Breeders Cup 006 Zenyatta Yadda Yadda

…Is it the pink stripe? Via

Which, as we now know, it didn’t. The great mare Zenyatta, trying to finish her career 20-0 before a well- deserved retirement, had one more race to run.

She finished second, but not before an onslaught of publicity from Breeders’ Cup broadcaster ESPN, which managed to cram her into nearly aspect of the coverage. The expectations built. And so did the pressure. Running against a tough field in the Breeders’ Cup Classic which included male horses– Rachel Alexandra notwithstanding, it’s generally unusual to see a female run well against males– Zenyatta carried the expectations of the entire industry into the gate on Saturday night.

This was not going to go well.

I’d have said that even if she’d won. Focusing the hopes and dreams of the entire industry on a single horse is pretty much never going to go well, whether the mount in question ends the day as the catastrophically injured Eight Belles or the victorious Rachel Alexandra. When said horse retires or– as is more likely– loses, what happens to all those insta- fans?

The past decade has been rife with near- Triple Crown misses, and the pressure has become unbearable for all of a horse’s connections when the Derby and the Preakness are won by the same horse. It’s not good for the horse; it’s not good for the industry.

Breeding runs in cycles. In the ’70′s, American racing had hit on the right combination of toughness, quickness, and stamina to produce several Triple Crown winners. Right now, the breed is short-starting, more delicate. Until fresh blood has revitalized the domestic form of the breed, I’m going to continue to cringe on behalf of the sport I love.

Watch a little here, a little there. Take some risks with exposure for races other than the Triple Crown and the Breeders’ Cup– networks, and the sport, might be pleasantly surprised.

Zenyatta is a big girl– six years old, and taller than Secretariat. Her owners are to be commended for continuing to run her beyond the usual 3-4 years which superstars usually serve. That’s good for the sport and good for the breed.

But stacking all expectations on a repeat is not.

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Art and Life

Posted on November 5th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

TV Couch: Pop psych ‘diagnoses’ of which mental disorders TV or reality TV characters suffer from

We’re in an era in which TV news anchors and commentators are in and of themselves becoming news–amassing hundreds of thousands on the Washington Mall, sparring about hypnosis with members of Congress, and in general perhaps just sad because no one’s paying then any attention at all, except perhaps to write snarky- mean blog posts about all the sparring.

Which is why I like to focus on fictional ones. They have fewer lawyers, for one, if not as many viewers. The Emmy for Impersonating a Competent News Anchor goes to Les Nessman of WKRP in Cincinnati, but, as we all know, he had a wonderfully incompetent precursor.

baxter5 Art and Life

Pre-Nessman: WJM’s Ted Baxter Via

Accomplished actor and actual smart person Ted Knight was so good at playing the hapless- yet- arrogant Ted Baxter that the poor guy was sometimes mistaken for his character. The Mary Tyler Moore Show, considered one of the greatest series of all time and the first true ensemble sitcom, featured the pompous anchorman as an integral part of the cast. He was hilariously terrible at his job. And he was a textbook sufferer of the Dunning–Kruger effect.

Dunning-Kruger is suffered by the– how do I say this nicely– the incompetent. Problem is, they don’t know they’re incompetent. Even when Simon tells them that they are.

And yet, Ted Baxter had the final laugh on his co-workers. After making their jobs infinitely more difficult than they needed to be, the series ended with the entire crew losing their jobs… except for him. It was regarded as some of the finest sitcom irony ever perpetuated by a former TV wife of Dick Van Dyke’s.

We all know a Ted Baxter. Maybe we are a Ted Baxter, or voted for one.

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TV Snowflakes: Alf's Hit Talk Show

Posted on November 5th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

Each is unique, and never to be repeated. We review obscure gems of TV shows that aired for one season (at most) before getting canceled.

Oh, and you thought the thing with the orange alien puppet was just one show? You must have missed the Saturday morning cartoon show, and the other Saturday morning cartoon show, and, yeah, the somewhat late night talk show.

showtitle2 TV Snowflakes: Alf's Hit Talk Show

This, apparently, actually happened. Via

Other TV Snowflakes we’ve discussed here lasted for at least a season. Alf’s Hit Talk Show? Not so much. Seven episodes. That is sad, if only for cable. If only for TV Land (DISH 106) cable. When your entry on the Internet Movie Database is measured in months instead of seasons, Things Did Not Go Well. They went so Not Well that any attempts to locate the show on TV Land‘s website is met with a big ol’ 404 error. Not here! Never existed!

Even sadder is the fact that Alf’s Hit Talk Show was an (admittedly somewhat horrible) idea maybe five years before its time. It was part of the then- gathering wave that is current 80′s nostalgia mania, one which had not yet roared ashore. This was 2004, the days of I Love the 80′s and the re-introduction of Strawberry Shortcake (wearing jeans.) We weren’t to full Betty White, grade schoolers dressed as Cyndi Lauper, Tron 3D high alert yet. Try Alf’s Hit Talk Show in 2010, and it might, indeed, live up to its title.

Alf’s Hit Talk Show, for those of you who have lives and missed this thing, was a bizarre combination of Space Ghost Coast to Coast, the original Alf, and The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson, complete with the late Ed McMahon acting as announcer and sidekick.

Oh, there were skits, and food on the desk, and the whole thing is kind of a blur now. Then again, this was an alien puppet which ate cats. Leave the now non-existent seven episodes where they are.

Tags: 80's, alf, tonight show, tv land
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Midterm Election Coverage Award

Posted on November 4th, 2010 by Mary Beth Ellis

I watched this crap so you didn’t have to. All you had to do was get up in the morning and try to drink away whichever particular results pissed you off.

ED AM515 noonan D 20101104181530 Midterm Election Coverage Award

Pick a face. Via

And there was a lot of pissing on Tuesday: Republicans and Independents on President Obama’s agenda; conservatives on Republicans; Democrats on Christine O’Donnell, and just about everybody on Charlie Crist, The Orangest Gubernatorial Candidate That Ever Was. But that doesn’t mean the evening wasn’t without a sublime highlight:

The Hannity & Colmes Memorial I Hate You/No, I Hate YOU Avatar Award goes to: MSNBC‘s (DISH 209) Chris Matthews and House re-election victor Rep. Michele Bachmann.

A bit of background: In 2008, Matthews asked an artful question which goaded Bachmann into announcing that, you know what, “I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America or anti-America?” She then retracted the statement, but not before becoming the immediate punching doll of the left’s blogosphere.

So when Bachmann returned to a split screen with Matthews after two years, she wasn’t gonna be sucked into any disucssion of anything but Pure Republican Awesome, no way, no how. Matthews, however, was quite eager to return to the poison well of OJ Media Overload, 2010 Edition, and asked if Bachmann was going to leap into a Republican Congress and perp-walk everybody from him on down to the monkey from Friends, and Bachmann responded with about five minutes of a talking points non-answer, which may have included, if my notes serve me correctly, a really great recipe for lemon squares.

In all, the exchange went exactly as well as you might expect. Politics is media, the media is politics, and I am going back to bed.

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