Category Archives: The Biz of Show

09.22.12
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Place your Bets (and lose): The Chair’s Guide to the Emmys

I knew awards shows were getting out of hand when several decades ago my Dad started asking me for inside information. This was because Las Vegas bookrooms were posting odds and taking bets on the Oscars.  We had a few good runs over several years  (a mint was made on Sofia Coppola winning best original screenplay for “Lost in Translation”), but recently Vegas wised up.  Their odds now give bettors such a low chance of return on their money (you have to put up something like $500 to win a mere $50 on an even a vaguely probable winner) that it’s barely worth it. The exception, of course, is hitting a year when someone like Marisa Tomei scores the upset of the century and gets gold for “My Cousin Vinny,” but we all know what the chances are of winning anything significant for acting in a broad comedy, right?  I mean, this isn’t politics.

There is even less chance and reward for figuring out who will win television’s annual Emmy Awards but that doesn’t stop all of us from jabbering on every year (or at least the weekend before the broadcast) about who will take home the sharp-winged lady. Seriously, have you ever held one?   it sort of feels like a murder weapon from an old Agatha Christie novel.  For those under 30 unfamiliar with Ms. Christie, think…oh, never mind…

That bitch will cut you.

Anyway, in the spirit of competition – and because the Chair will be attending and live blogging Sunday night’s Emmy Awards from the Nokia Theatre (hint hint, visit the blog)– but mostly because The Chair LOVES being embarrassed by making wrong predictions. The following is a guide to the winners AND losers of the evening.  But not all of them because there are approximately 963 categories.

Disclaimer:  There are also now approximately 963 TV channels so there is NO ONE in the world who can possibly judge who will win television’s highest honor (isn’t the latter syndication money?) both intelligently and accurately. Luckily, intelligence and accuracy are not particularly valued at this time in our history.  So – here goes.

Outstanding Lead Actor, Drama

Something about a man in uniform

The Nominees: Steve Buscemi (Boardwalk Empire), Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad), Michael C. Hall (Dexter), Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey), Damian Lewis (Homeland), Jon Hamm (Mad Men).

Winner: Damian Lewis

Loser: Jon Hamm

Jon Hamm’s Don Draper has never won an Emmy?  No.  He should win this year, especially since MM’s creator Matt Weiner specifically wrote one of his Emmy-nominated scripts this season specifically to give the star a chance to show off by playing everything from seductive abuser to vomiting sick husband over the space of 60 minutes.  Still, fan favorite Steve Carrell was never shown Emmy love for The Office and it seems to get tougher to get the crowd’s attention as time goes on.  Enter Damian Lewis, a British actor playing an American POW turned potential terrorist in the first season of the much-heralded Homeland.  Enuf said.  Except that all of the actors in the category are as deserving.  But especially Jon Hamm (did I mention Jon Hamm??)

Heyyyy Jon…

Outstanding Lead Actress, Drama 

The Nominees: Glenn Close(Damages), Michelle Dockery (Downton Abbey), Julianna Margulies (The Good Wife), Kathy Bates (Harry’s Law), Claire Danes (Homeland), Elisabeth Moss (Mad Men)

Winner: Claire Danes

Loser: Claire Danes

Claire Danes portrayal of a brilliant and bipolar CIA agent is astounding.  She will win.  If she doesn’t win, she deserves equal attention as loser du jour because, in case I didn’t mention it, she’s brilliant in the part.  Really enuf said.

Outstanding Supporting Actor, Drama

The Nominees: Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad), Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad), Brendan Coyle (Downton Abbey), Jim Carter (Downton Abbey), Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones), Jared Harris (Mad Men).

Winner: Giancarlo Esposito

Loser: Jared Harris

I’m taking the word of too many of my friends who say I’m an idiot for not regularly watching Breaking Bad.  So at the very least I have to acknowledge their insistence that Esposito will win.  Though I am a Downton Abbey fan (you can’t be surprised by that), no one role on the series is showy enough to take Emmy home.  Dinaklage and Paul are quite good but don’t have the heat behind them this year.  Jared Harris does, especially since it’s not easy to be convincing for more than a few moments as a hanging corpse, much less through a whole series of scenes.  Still, I’m predicting a Mad Men backlash in as many categories as a television awards show can muster because the broadcast networks are fed up and jealous.

Outstanding Supporting Actress, Drama 

Still cringing…

The Nominees: Anna Gunn (Breaking Bad), Maggie Smith (Downton Abbey), Joanne Froggatt (Downton Abbey), Archie Panjabi (The Good Wife), Christine Baranski (The Good Wife), Christine Hendricks (Mad Men)

Winner:  Christina Hendricks

Loser:  Maggie Smith

Any TV watcher knows these are all terrific actresses.  However, sometimes an episode comes along during a season where a character and an actress are asked to make a turn so shocking that, if it works and works well, you need at least a new VW bug (I have an old one) to cart all the accolades away.  Such is the case for Christina Hendricks and what she had to endure playing poor Joan this year.  If you haven’t seen The Other Woman episode I’m not going to spoil it other than to say – I’m still upset!  But I mean, then there’s the Dowager Countess, who is of course brilliant. Snide, funny and wicked… I kind of want to see her reaction when she’s snubbed.

Speaking of cutting a bitch…

 

Outstanding Leading Actor in a Comedy

The Nominees: Jim Parsons (The Big Bang Theory), Larry David (Curb Your Enthusiasm), Don Cheadle (House of Lies), Louis C.K. (Louie), Alec Baldwin (30 Rock), Jon Cryer (Two and a Half Men). 

Winner:  Jim Parsons

Loser: Louis C.K.

Jim Parsons is hilarious in a very broad, traditional three-camera sitcom fashion.  The problem is he’s doing the same performance year after year and has lately won year and after year.  Since in some circles television is all about entertaining repetition (and it feels like Alec Baldwin has been coasting a little bit as of late), expect JP to take the stage.  Like the even more wicked offspring of Larry David, expect Louis C.K. to be similarly ignored.  He’s so good he makes it look soooo easy.  And that rarely gets you an Emmy.

Outstanding Lead Actress, Comedy 

The Nominees: Lena Dunham (Girls), Melissa McCarthy (Mike & Molly), Zooey Deschanel (New Girl), Edie Falco (Nurse Jackie), Amy Poehler (Parks and Recreation), Tina Fey (30 Rock), Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Veep).

Winner:  Amy Poehler

Loser: Zooey Deschanel

It’s Amy Poehler’s time and she’s never won.  And she deserves it for not only a great season but for helping steer a show that had a less than auspicious creative debut into one of the best half hour comedies now running.  As my friend says about Zooey Deschanel – she’s adorkable and that’s hard to do every week on television.  Plus, she’s has also taken a show with another less than auspicious pilot and made it much better than anyone could have ever expected.  But – it’s not her time.  Yet.

Outstanding Supporting Actor, Comedy

Club promoter: Baloney Danza

The Nominees: Ed O’Neill (Modern Family), Jesse Tyler Ferguson (Modern Family), Ty Burrell (Modern Family), Eric Stonestreet (Modern Family),Max Greenfield (New Girl), Bill Hader (Saturday Night Live).

Winner:  Bill Hader

Loser:  Bill Hader if he doesn’t win.

One word – Stefon.  The Modern Family guys are good but still doing the same shtick.  Max Greenfield is good but it’s not his…well, you know.

Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy

The Nominees: Mayim Bialik (The Big Bang Theory), Kathryn Joosten (Desperate Housewives), Julie Bowen (Modern Family), Sofia Vergara (Modern Family), Merritt Wever (Nurse Jackie), Kristen Wiig (Saturday Night Live).

Winner: Kristen Wiig

Loser:  Everyone else

Seriously, this IS Kristin Wiig’s year.  I mean, even The Chair was touched when Mick Jagger sang her sendoff on her last episode of SNL this season.  Plus, there was the Liza Minnelli Turns off A Lamp sketch.

Click for the hilarious video

KW also co-wrote and starred in “Bridesmaids,” the biggest grossing (and grossest) comedy of last year.  You can’t stop a tidal wave.

Outstanding Writing, Drama

The Nominees: Julian Fellows (“Episode 7,” Downton Abbey); Semi Chellas, Matthew Weiner (“The Other Woman,” Mad Men), Andre Jacquemetton, Maria Jacquemetton (“Commissions and Fees,” Mad Men); Semi Chellas, Matthew Weiner (“Far Away Places,” Mad Men); Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon, Gideon Raff (“Pilot,” Homeland.)

Winner: Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon, Gideon Raff (Homeland)

Loser:  Any episode of Mad Men

There is nothing on television as consistently original, thought provoking and chance taking as Mad Men (have I said that?) – especially when one considers its fifth season was probably its most risky.  Yet Homeland managed to take the suspense/political conspiracy genre to an entirely new level with an equal marriage of plot and character.  Any writer knows this is nearly impossible to do yet what most every dramatic writer strives for.  Kudos.

Outstanding Writing, Comedy 

Hipster paradise.

The Nominees: Chris McKenna (“Remedial Chaos Theory,” Community), Lena Dunham (“Pilot,” Girls), Louis C.K. (“Pregnant,” Louie), Amy Poehler (“The Debate,” Parks and Recreation), Michael Schur (“Win, Lose or Draw,” Parks and Recreation)

Winner:  Lena Dunham (Girls)

Loser: All of the other writers

Originality tends to be most rewarded in the writing categories, particularly in comedy.  Lena Dunham is a triple threat Emmy nominee (writer; director; actress) this year but it’s her unique worldview in Girls that makes the show so special. Some see it as comedy.  Others see it as tragedy.  We see it as winning.  An Emmy – not the Charlie Sheen kind.

Outstanding Miniseries or Made for TV Movie

The Nominees: American Horror Story, Game Change, Hatfields & McCoys, Hemingway & Gellhorn, Luther, Sherlock: A Scandal in Belgravia.

Winner: Game Change

Loser: American Horror Story

It’s too hard for television to resist Julianne Moore’s Sarah Palin or a chance to twist the dagger a little deeper into everyone’s favorite political mean girl  gal. (Ugh, please don’t write and say I’m sexist – she is mean!  And I crossed out girl, didn’t I?!)  Is Game Change the BEST in this category?  Well, no.  That’d be American Horror Story.  Because it’s the sickest, most wickedly funny and oddly twisted dramatic thing to come along in quite a while.  True – it’s not perfect by a long shot but isn’t that what makes it so great? (that’s rhetorical).

Outstanding Comedy

The Nominees: The Big Bang Theory, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Girls, Modern Family, 30 Rock, Veep.

Winner: Modern Family

Loser: Girls

Girls is disturbing, uncomfortable, funny, sad and even slightly full of itself.  Just like life.  It is also new and different and even a little creepy so it won’t win even though it should.  Look for the entire cast and creators of Modern Family to go traipsing across the stage.  It’s a well-done show, but more importantly, makes people in network television feel hip and contemporary (which very few of them or even us are, especially those of us making snide remarks about other people’s work).  However, Veep?  Really?

Outstanding Drama

Don’t turn… away that is.

The Nominees: Boardwalk Empire, Breaking Bad, Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones, Homeland, Mad Men

Winner:  Homeland

Loser:  Mad Men

Mad Men is THE best written, acted and everything else shows on television.  There is NO debate about this.  Sorry.  And one could argue that this past season was its strongest.  However, if Matt Weiner & Co. walk away with best drama series this time it will be five years in a row and those who work in the TV industry aren’t ready to make AMC a record holder of anything.  Homeland is a more traditional show but brilliant in a different way.  The other nominees are also all excellent series.  This is the rarest of rare “embarrassment of riches” category.

OK, now it’s time for you to share your predictions in the comments, and join The Chair on Sunday, starting at 8pm EST/5pm PST for a hashtag filled moment-by-moment biting Emmy commentary. #JimmyKimmelwantstoknow

 

 

06.17.12
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Eating Oreos in a Mallomar World

Your pick

This all started when I went to see “The Avengers” a few days ago (yes, I was late to the party).  Staring back at me in the climactic Third Act moment when the Hulk is wrecking N.Y. (and no, at this point it’s not a spoiler) were these words on what was supposed to be a big city storefront but looked about as phony as Donald Trump’s hair:

“We Are Insurance. We Are Farmers” 

Now at first I chalked it up to “well, that’s the way it is in our commercial world” and that there could perhaps be that insurance store, or even ad slogan on another building right there as the Hulk was wreaking havoc in Manhattan.  But when the phrase got it’s big lingering close-up a second time I realized I was now in the world of specific payment positioning and suddenly it wasn’t about the Hulk at all but the mammoth strength and power of a corporate interest whose product its producers hoped I might at one point have actually bought.  I use the past tense here because though it’s been 25 years plus with Farmers for me, the company’s blatant obnoxiousness in interrupting a movie I wasn’t particularly loving, created the opposite effect.  It caused me to begin to consider if I even wanted to continue with them.  Perhaps I could instead switch to that adorable Gecko called Geico.  Or maybe phone or text Flo, the cool Progressive Insurance Lady.  Not only are they both snide and funny like me, but I’ll bet they’d also have enough taste to not insert themselves in the middle of the third act of a mindless action film I didn’t want to see in the first place but somehow found myself pressured into vaguely enjoying.  That’s a strategy I’d like to at least reward with, well – something.

I feel ya, Hulk.

Of course, it didn’t stop there.   The next morning I’m pumping gas, still considering cancelling with Farmers, and happen to see Ted is coming. (That’s a movie billboard, not a vagrant named Ted).  Then I look down on the ground next to the gas pump and see a very large, very red “Seattle’s Best Coffee Inside” poster right under my feet — like it’s reading my mind, knowing I’m thinking about advertising.  And yes, since I knew you wouldn’t believe me – I took this picture.

You sure do.

That afternoon I subsequently talk with a student and see a Disney character is on her T-Shirt.  I turn on the radio in my car on the way home and it’s selling me an all-natural bug repellant.  And once home, on my beloved cable TV channel, they’re assuming I have erectile dysfunction or bladder leakage and need either powerful herbal supplements or a sleek, comfortable adult diaper that is called something else but let’s face it, they are diapers.  Plus, to make matters worse, I can’t even figure out if I’d rather be impotent or incontinent.  Pick your poison (or mine).  My gambling Dad actually would put these odds at “pick ‘em’ – which means the outcome could go either way, though in this case both choices are equally heinous.

Certainly ads have been around a long time.  Advertising Age lists the first newspaper ad in 1704, though it is eminently possible the Coliseum in Rome had one or two emperors seeking lion sponsors.  But if Mitt Romney is right and “corporations are people, my friend” then in today’s world we all have many, many more friends than even the ones on our Facebook page, and many of them even more faux than in our virtual existence.

a peculiar delight

Speaking of friends and advertising, did you know you can see, in syndication reruns, many of the NBC “Friends” eating Oreos they never ate at the time their episode originally aired simply because Nabisco or some other parent company inserted the box and/or cookies into their filmic hands in 2012?  And that this is not limited to “Friends” and NBC but includes pretty much all of your fave characters in any episode of any other show you choose to watch?  I mean, what if they’re more a part of the Mallomars/Ding Dong kind of crowd?  Or at the very least, people who crave Lorna Doones?  The possibilities are endless for any advertiser who has the time and money to buy them the snack of their choice.

Elvis v. L-VIS

This was news to me but has been going on since 1999 when a new technology called L–V.I.S. (pronounced Elvis – as in, well, you know who) was launched.   Yes, a computer program named for the King of Rock and Roll that does all this and more, begging the question: did they have to get approval from the REAL Elvis, or the Elvis Presley estate, to name themselves this?  Whatever the answer is, you at least have to give this company credit for being so out there with who it is that it’s very name comes from a show business legend many years after he even existed, especially without his full endorsement of them in the first place.

Unless… can you endorse from the grave?

But this technology does allow David Schwimmer (Ross Geller) to eat Oreos at a table on a random syndicated episode of “Friends” when he never specifically did so in the original scene, nor, for all we know, did his creators ever intend him do so (certainly not at that moment). It can also magically display a new ad for a 2011 movie, like say “Bad Teacher,” in a “How I Met Your Mother” episode originally shot 5 years earlier in 2006 for the show’s second season.  (And no, the HIMYM plot in that episode didn’t have a time travel theme).

Bad move?

To be clear, a widely used computer program literally drops the ad of a corporation’s choice into any rerun TV episode or feature film past and present whether its creators want it to or not.  And speaking for writers and producers and directors and actors who take their storytelling personally, let’s put it another way – you’re the parent of a six-year old (as many artists consider their offspring) and the school or day care center you’ve entrusted their care to is allowed to force feed them Oreos or Snickers or perhaps even have them use a series of really bad diapers or insect repellents not only without your consent but even without your knowledge.

As sports fans know, this is not only limited to film.  There is a practice where a computer program can continually and magically create stadium billboards of its choice at any number of live baseball games you watch on TV that friends (the real ones) who might actually be at the game don’t see because those billboard ads don’t actually exist in their real live world.  No — those ads are only reserved for those of us who choose not to or can’t afford to or attend the game live but instead find ourselves watching it on the TV or tablet of our choice.  So rather than paying for a real stadium billboard ad that goes to just thousands, a company can computer generate a virtual ad that will, in turn, reach many millions – even when all the time the millions watching are assuming they’re viewing exactly what they’d be seeing if they were live at the game.

Amazing

For some of us, none of this is real news. Studios now have whole departments for this purpose with names like “product integration” as opposed to what it used to be called when I worked in movie marketing – product placement.  Consider the clever corporate wordsmith—ness of the new term, which, if nothing else, proves we all have no chance to survive unscathed.  Placement, you see, implies a sort of fake insertion meant to look real yet is still inauthentic and usually implies undesirable.  Whereas the word integration harkens back to “equality” – a time in the sixties when we as a society decided to come down on the side of “fairness” and make civil rights for all the priority.  Well – what’s more preferable to you – choiceless fake insertion or being in/on the right side of history in fairness and equality?  As a corporate American company trying to tempt you into buying my product, I’ll always fly the patriotic flag of freedom and choose product integration so at least I can appear to be fair.  Especially where involuntary insertion (nee placement) is the other option, right?  Because as far as insertion goes, it is commonly accepted that a human being should always at least be asked.

These ad/marketing tricks.  No wonder “Mad Men” is so popular.  Matt Weiner must spend months every season creating a subliminal popularity formula within every 12 (or is it 13?) episodes.

Even Peggy can’t get excited for Heinz beans

Now don’t get me wrong — overall there’s nothing wrong with using real life products creatively.  Ask any screenwriter in particular and he or she will tell you that most of us do that.  Humphrey Bogart had to watch as not just any gin but a specific bottle of Gordon’s Dry Gin was thrown off the boat in 1951’s “The African Queen,” while Joan Crawford got to take some belts from a real bottle of Jack Daniels (at least that’s the label on the outside, though one can surmise otherwise) when she appeared in “Mildred Pierce” six years prior.  Not to mention the Reese’s Pieces famously consumed in “E.T.: The Extraterrestrial” because M & M’s, the original candy of choice, famously turned down Steven Spielberg’s original offer of insertion. (Uh, Epic fail, as the kids say, Mars, Inc,).  And even the then-hipper-than-hip AOL (uh, yes they were in the pre-Internet age) theme became the chief corporate tie-in of the Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan comedy “You’ve Got Mail.”

The former bane of my existence

Yes – we indeed do live in a label-ridden world and to not include characters eating, drinking, watching or listening to something recognizable is to deny them real world existence.  Even I knew this in the late eighties when, as a young writer, I was foolish enough to use the Rolling Stones song “Street Fighting Man” in a script to thematically evoke both character and time period, never realizing that one of the cardinal rules for spec script writing is to NEVER use a Beatles or Stones song (which are preemptively expensive to license) and expect it to be used if your movie actually gets made.

Actually, I did sort of know the rule but used it anyway because, well, it sounded perfect and was absolutely right and what were the chances we’d ever face the licensing hurdle in real life?  I mean, who would ever dream I’d actually win the writing lottery that one time and the damned thing would really and truly get bought and filmed in my lifetime?

It was back then that I quickly learned, as Hollywood corporations now know, that there are indeed thousands of choices for actual products, songs and contemporary references that can be inserted (ahem, integrated), changed or used to make the same exact point.  Sometimes even better than the ones you intended.

Well, at least that’s what my producers told me.  Though when I think about it – I still believe only that one particular Stones song would have perfect.  In fact, to this day I wonder if that was the reason why my movie was not the award-winning coming of age drama I intended, I’m sure of it.

Okay, not really.  But maybe a little.  Partly.

When I’m not dwelling in the past, though, here’s what I really and truly think.  On a recent trip to The Hulk’s Manhattan, walking down Times Square and its billboards and licensed rights, I can see myself as I look around.  And soon, very soon, I find myself longing for the 1970’s porn palaces of my youth that I now find far, far less offensive than anything in New York bearing the word Trump (or some other reasonable facsimile).  Feeling this way, then I wonder – have we made progress or should progress be called by some other name?  Then I wonder even further – what would Elvis, not L–V.I.S., have to say?

And then I finally ask myself one last question — Am I the only one who even cares?