"We'll Put on a Performance Like They'll Never Forget!"

In case you can't tell from the title of this blog, I'm still hate-watching Smash. I've had it with the over the top drama that begs the question, does the content serve the form or the form serve the content? I mean, this IS a show about the drama of Broadway. Is the ridiculous drama meant to immerse us into that culture? Or could the show possibly be approached from a slightly different form that would allow us to appreciate the drama of the actual musical within the show. As it stands now, the scenes that are musical numbers seem LESS strained than the interactions between characters and bipolar plot twists. Talk about some high highs and some low lows...

How can these people afford to sit around and wait for Jennifer Hudson to save their show?

Glee has desensitized us from being turned off by characters bursting into song. Nashville has worked music into the drama of their show seamlessly. But Smash...well...it plays like...a musical. Which to some people is bad enough. Remember when you took your friend to see Evita and they were like..."What! There was no talking!" It happens. The thing is, I'm a person who loves musicals. But I like GOOD musicals. Smash is not too different from the off-off---OFF Broadway shows that it's referring to in the film. The only thing is that...those musicals don't get NEAR the attention or talent that is given to this one. It would never have such a "high-powered" financial backer like Anjelica Huston's character. Nor those writers with so much success under their belts.

You're gonna love me.

Now when I say talent, I am being very hesitant and even selective. I mean...Ivy. She is the only enjoyable part of this show. Watching Debra Messing with a perma-frown is no fun after her years as Grace...and where is her hair? Jennifer Hudson's appearance was simply to boost the show back onto our radar. And don't EVEN get me started on Katherine McPhee. Is there like a "Fembot American Idol Club" that she and Carrie Underwood are members of? You can be pretty all day long, but can you carry on a conversation? Can you raise your eyebrows in time with your emotions? Come on! I worry that someone like Idina Menzel is going to get pegged for this show...but I seriously hope she will remember her RENT days and jump over the moon, laughing at "the man" (the man being Smash) all the way. Of course, her level of talent might be what it takes to save this show. Do we want it saved?

Frenemies. More of this please.

Aside from the talent, the writers of this show should be ashamed of themselves. No one gets away with rhetorical dialogue without a laugh track or a Shonda Rhimes backing. Stop writing the obvious and throw us for a loop. Let Ivy lean into her badness. Let Katherine lose her ridiculous faux innocence that no one even buys because we all know in real life she's a bitch, and let's get on with this thing. Enough with the affair scandals. We want to see you focus on 2 things: The Musical and The Competition. And by the way, this season better end with the musical being on GO, so that next season (oh geez, I just said that...) can be about the drama of actually making a musical. And here's the thing...if the show will get it's act together...then I guarantee we could be seeing an ACTUAL SMASH MUSICAL on Broadway in a few years. Stranger things have happened. Right?

Look, I gave up on Revenge. I gave up on Once Upon a Time. Smash...you're next if you don't watch out. Now..get out there and give me a performance that I'll never forget!

Are you (still) watching Smash? What do you think?

The Best of 2012

These are in no way REALLY the "best" of the year, but here are a few of my best things from 2012.

This. Kid.

Best Reality Show-Here Comes Honey Boo Boo
Don't talk to me about Duck Dynasty. This is the real deal.

Best New Show-Nashville
I love it. It makes me want to revisit the city, it makes me want to listen to country music. The drama is great, the acting is great, the music is great, and I get swept up in it each week.

Best Drama-Parenthood
This should win for consistency if nothing else. Each and every episode delivers, which is rare. Usually there are hits and misses, but this one is on the money from week to week.

Best Comedy-30 Rock
Two Broke Girls, Modern Family, Raising Hope...I love them, but Tina Fey and this darling show will have my loyalty for the little time it has left on the air.

Best Song-We Are Young by Fun
It's a feel good song, it's upbeat, the lyrics are good, and it's smart. I could listen to this all day, and there have been days that I have.

Best Album-Babel by Mumford and Sons
Mumford and Sons is my go to music for the Fall and Winter. This new album by them is as good as their last, if not better. I can't wait to see what they do next!

Best Movie-Life of Pi
I watched A LOT of movies this year, but if I had to choose the best one FROM this year, I'd say it was this one. It was a creative and solid story as well as, suspenseful, action packed, funny, sentimental, and even carried a little twist ending.

Best "Breakout" Star-Olivia Wilde
Olivia Wilde is in no way new to stardom, but she is new to movies, and this year she did a lot of them. The Words, Butter, People Like Us, and more. She played drastically different roles in each of them and did a great job. I am not sure she will ever hold down a leading lady spot, but I would love to see her try.

Everyone will know her name.

Best Underage Star-Chloe Grace Moretz
She's not new, but the more I watch her, the more I am super impressed. I can't wait to see her in Carrie coming in 2013!

Best "I Changed My Mind About Her" Star-Carey Mulligan
I wrote a blog earlier in the year about Mulligan and my doubt about her being cast as Daisy on Gatsby. While we are still waiting to see how she does in this movie, I have seen so much of her this year that I have changed my mind about her. She's beautiful, brilliant, vulnerable but strong, and when she's on screen I can't help but be enthralled by her. I admit, I judged her too quickly.

Best Celebrity Moment-Any Rebel Wilson interview
Best Celebrity Moment 2-Any Emma Stone interview
Best Celebrity Moment 3-Any Kristen Bell interview
These three are always perfectly adorable and hilarious during their interviews, unlike weirdos Kristen Stewart, Nicole Kidman, and Melanie Griffin. Watching those three on live TV is horrifying.

Well played.

Best Politician Moment-Obama playing Spiderman with a kid.
Adorable. Take note politicians, we live in an internet age. If you want to win an election, you MUST be likable on the internet.

This friendship is one of my favorite.

Best Politician Moment 2-Texts with Hillary Memes
She's just the coolest.

Best Bad Story Turned Good-The Bullied Bus Driver
I could mention Christian Bale's visit to the families of the dead and injured who were show in the theater during The Dark Knight Rises, but the bus driver story really stuck with me. When I read about the horrible things that this woman had to endure driving a bus of brats to and from school daily, I felt sick. To make things worse, she went home to a somewhat sad life each night. When America got wind of the video on the bus, people reached out to this woman with money, gifts, kind words, and more. She has since retired from driving on her over $600 grand worth of donations, some of which she gave to charity. I love when the good in humanity sees the bad and works to make up for it.

How does he look so scary!

Best Bad Guy Hair-Javier Bardem. Always.

He looks weird with clothes on.

Best Sports Moment-I didn't pay attention since Auburn was so bad. But probably something to do with Michael Phelp's abs.

Best Book-We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
This is one of the most haunting and well written books I have ever read. It's not from this year, but I did read it this year, so that's something.

Best App for iPhone-Pocket
I love this app cause I can just move everything I want to read and put it into one place. So when I'm sitting in a waiting room or wherever (I'll just say it, the bathroom), I can catch up on blogs, articles, and more! I'm a dork, I know, but this has been a really great thing to have this year in China!

What is on your BEST of 2012 list?

Thoughts on TV and Some Other Stuff

Whoopie Goldberg reprised her role from Ghost on 666 Park Avenue this week.

The devil/demons in American Horror Story are hands down more terrifying than anything on 666 Park Avenue, AND Walking Dead...except maybe the Governor. That guy's a freak.

Can someone feed Julie Bowen?

That guy agrees.

I have 3 degrees, have traveled to 8 countries, have lived in 5 states, and have already held down 1 successful career in my life, but cannot find a full time job. Finn gets kicked out of the military, has never left Ohio, and lands a job working at a school at age 19.

Santana is the only thing worth watching about Glee. Ever.

Remember that jerk from The Bachelor, Jake? Yeah, Kristin Chenoweth is dating him. She apparently hit her head on the set of The Good Wife and it made her have this awakening that life is too short and she should do what makes her happy. I am betting when she recovers fully from this head injury, she will also recover from her huge mistake of dating Jake.

She's gonna make him pop-u-lar.

Revenge is the biggest flop this season. It's like watching a soap opera. I keep waiting for Stefano to come in and ruin things for everyone.

Nashville is seriously rising to the top of my list as best show on TV.

Kate Middleton is pregnant. Adorable. Next up, I'm calling it...Jennifer Aniston. Julie...start preparing your gushing blog!

Dexter...you're killing me with this Russian mafia in Miami, borderline incestual stuff. KILLING ME.

Taylor Swift is dating someone...

Grey's Anatomy's April and her thoughts on God/ her regurgitation of personal conviction is probably very normal for a Christian girl who promised herself to wait and has broken her promise. However, it makes her look crazy, and those thoughts need to be an internal monologue...that we never have to hear.

Grey's Anatomy's Jackson is hot. Have I mentioned that?

Adam Levine criticized Honey Boo Boo this week, saying something about her existence being the sign of a demise of Western Civilization. Adam...you, rebel you. Just sit there and look pretty please.

Don't fill your head with silly thoughts, just sing.

Um, Fleetwood Mac is going on tour in 2013. I think this is my chance to see them. Also, I think I want to make 2013 the year of concerts. I don't even know what to do at concerts, but I love music and so it's time to figure it out.

Lindsay Lohan is...I can't. I just don't have the energy.

What notable things did I miss?

Agenda vs. Awareness

It’s no secret that Hollywood has a “hidden” agenda. Lots of them. And they leak out through the TV we watch. You might think you are just sitting down to watch Law and Order, SVU, enjoy a good crime drama, but then Olivia Benson starts throwing out some facts about rape or abandoned children and before you know it, it feels less like a crime drama and more like a lecture.

Lots of shows do this, but some do it better than others. And there’s a difference in Agenda and Awareness. This blog is going to try to explore and explain that difference.

Agenda:

When I think of Agenda the first show that comes to mind is Glee. Agenda tries to make you feel guilty about not embracing whatever issue it presents. It’s heavy handed and wants to drive you to action. It’s full of rhetoric, extremes, and fails to SHOW the issue at hand, but rather TELLS you the issue at hand. Agenda does not know its audience.

Glee has done this with a few things. Sexuality and Bullying (and more specifically, bullying BECAUSE of sexuality) are at the top of the list. Having a gay character on a show is not a big deal anymore. But Glee kind of acted like it was. And it acted this way in EVERY EPISODE for the better part of 2 seasons. While there were moments of heartfelt interactions between Kurt and his father, for the most part Glee kept on keeping on with reminding us just how hard being gay was for Kurt. He was picked apart and picked on, lots of tears, lots of statements about not fitting in. And then there was the horrible and awkward thing with the football player who assaulted him but then became someone he wanted to help....and then Kurt seemed to be fine, once he met Blaine and the perils of his sexuality were lessened because he wasn’t alone in it anymore. Then Santana came out, Britney expressed her bi-sexuality, and so forth and so on. 

Thanks for spelling it out for us Glee.

Glee beat us over the head with the sexuality issue. Instead of approaching it with some subtlety, and letting us watch the progression of how these teenagers handled themselves, each episode came with a monologue delivered by some character who was practically spotlighted and looking at the camera teaching the audience something. And who is the audience of Glee? Mostly, people under 25: the one demographic in America that really doesn’t care much about sexuality anymore. They have a live and let live mentality. Also the demographic that is going to do what they’re going to do no matter what a TV show says. 

Awareness:

When I think of Awareness, Parenthood comes to mind. Awareness dangles something out there for you to see, but doesn’t push it on you. It kind of says, hey...we’re all thinking about this topic here, but we get that it might not be on your mind as much as it is ours. Even so, Awareness wants to bring you up to date and let you know that this thing, whatever it might be, is happening and well...you might want to at least be...aware.

Now, having said all that, I do appreciate what Glee was/is trying to do. I just think they do it poorly. But take another show by Ryan Murphy, American Horror Story, and let’s discuss the very same issue. One of the main characters on the show is a lesbian in the 1960’s, which was obviously frowned upon at the time. As they try to “fix” her on the show, she doesn’t spend much time talking about how hard it is for her in life, nor does anyone else really bully her. Instead, the show simply puts her in a mental institution (with lots of other characters “suffering” from other afflictions) and gives her “conversion/aversion therapy” to solve her lesbianism. She is forced to look at pictures of women and injected with something to make her vomit when she sees the pictures. (The aversion part.) Then she is asked to look at a man and touch herself, and him. (The conversion part.) 

Worst. Therapist. Ever.

Watching that one scene was more effective than 2 seasons of Glee’s trying to teach us that sexuality is not something that is chosen, not something to be picked on. Because it didn’t lecture or throw out statistics or dumb things down for us. It just worked a perfectly viable scene from the 1960’s into the show and it was believable and horrible all at the same time, making anyone with any sort of compassion or basic appreciation for humanity want to scream, “Just leave her alone!”

I am aware now. I get it. And awareness can spur someone to action just as easily, if not more effectively than agenda. Awareness says...here’s what’s going on and here’s what you could do about it, but it’s up to you if you want to. Agenda says, you’re wrong/bad/evil if you don’t do what we think you should do.

I mentioned Parenthood as an example of a show that does awareness well. The center storyline of the show this season is Christina’s breast cancer. The writers do a great job at showing how it affects the entire family. Rather than spouting off statistics or over explaining the finer points of breast cancer, we watch someone go through it. And honestly, it’s not trying to convince us to do anything, it’s just making us aware of what people might go through who face this disease. The same way it makes us aware weekly what it might be like to live with a kid who has Aspergers. Or what it might be like to adopt an older child of a different ethnicity. All of the issues that Parenthood explores, happens in the context of the characters’ lives. I never feel like I’m being guilted or even manipulated, even though they make me cry every week. I don’t cry because of the issues the characters are facing, I cry because I can imagine what they are feeling. It’s good writing, good acting, sweet or sad, and pretty true to life in a lot of ways. It tugs on the heartstrings, shows flawed characters, and lets us imagine ourselves in their shoes.

Such a good crier. Take notes Claire Danes.

The truth is, almost every show has a hot button topic from time to time. Every producer/writer/creator wants to bring attention to something that has most likely affected them personally in some way. And even though you know my philosophy, TV IS FOR ENTERTAINMENT, ultimately, writers write what they know. Here are just a few other shows that work through agenda/awareness.

Two Broke Girls-The state of the economy/Reclaiming sex for women/Feminism. 

Scandal-The pervasive corrupt personal and business practices in politics.

Homeland-Perpetuating conspiracy theorists/Justifying the need for Homeland Security.

Modern Family-Challenging current beliefs of what “family” should look like.

SVU-Sexual crimes.

Nashville-Playing games associated with fame/Corrupt politics.

I could go on, but I will leave some for discussion. 

What shows come to your mind (past or present) that have an agenda or try to drive awareness home about any given issue? Was it agenda or awareness? Was it successful?

TV That Surprised Me

Every once in a while I get surprised by a TV show. Usually you can tell by who the creator/writer or who stars in it what it will be like. But sometimes you just can't know until...you just know.

BAD surprises:
When I was in college I took a bowling class. I am a pretty good bowler. So imagine my surprise at midterm when I had a low B in the class. I asked the teacher why, and he said that I hadn't shown any improvement. I was nailing strikes left and right but when you start strong, it's hard to have anywhere to go. That's what happened with these next two shows. Revenge and Once Upon A Time both came out of the gate with amazing first seasons. When I took a screen writing class, the teacher told us that the first thing you have to know about any character in order to care about them is to know what they want. We knew that Emily wanted to avenge her Father and Henry wanted Emma to believe him.

They really jumped the shark balcony early on this one...

In season 2 of these shows, I'm not really sure what anyone wants. So many added characters make them both feel like Jane Austen books. All those characters so fast mean I really don't care about them that much anymore. No one is special, and I have no idea what anyone wants anymore. Both shows started out with laser focus and got too broad. A show with staying power will start broad and get laser focused on various story lines from time to time. Take Parenthood or Grey's Anatomy for example. There are broad things happening within the larger cast, but different shows focus in on different characters and then go broad again. I think Revenge will make it 3 seasons, but I'm not sure Once Upon A Time will come back. Especially with both of these shows being on Sunday which is kind of the golden night of TV this year: Walking Dead, 666 Park Avenue, Dexter, Homeland, NFL, Nova, The Good Wife, The Mentalist, House, and Storage Wars.

Who are you and what have you done with...anyone we care about?

I shouldn't say I'm surprised by Glee. You can tell Glee is slowing down by how many guest appearances are being made. Sure Kate Hudson showed up early on, but remember the 2nd and 3rd season when every celebrity around wanted to be on the show? Trying to keep one eye on NYC and other on Ohio has us confused as to what we are really supposed to care about. And keeping the stories intertwined is going to be difficult. It could so easily become Smash, except Smash does Smash better than Glee can do Smash. So the thing about Glee is that it can revive itself so easily. It still has the fan base, it still has the characters, and it still has the music. If the show lets go of the "issues" that drive it and starts to embrace the people, gets laser focused on them and their families, gets us rooting for them again, and reminds us what it is that they really want, it can thrive. If it keeps on as is, it will barely survive.

GOOD surprises:
Scary TV is IN. American Horror Story and The Walking Dead have upped the ante from the suspenseful crime dramas and launched kind of a new genre of TV. 666 Park Avenue falls into this new category. Think Gossip Girl meets American Horror Story. The characters are solid and have enough mystery to keep it going. The spook factor is good. And the protagonist is smart and has gumption. Each episode plays around with a story from the past, which is good for the haunted part of the show, but I want to see more plot movement for the overall arc. Still, I was pleasantly surprised by the substance of this show.

Seriously, this show makes me laugh OUT LOUD.

By now you know I prefer drama to comedy. It's not that I don't like comedy, it's that it's REALLY hard to find good comedy. Well, I've found two this season that I love. My friend Joni introduced me to Two Broke Girls, and EVEN THOUGH IT HAS A LAUGH TRACK, I love it. The girls compliment each other well. The banter is typical sit-com banter, quick and punny, but something about it on this show seems a little more real. The sexual innuendo is less innuendo and more in your face, but the friendship between the girls and the set up of the show is brilliant. Now don't judge me for this next one. I love Jamie Gertz, and might have been the only person who felt sorry for her in the movie Twister. Her new show is The Neighbors. Yes, it's about aliens. I know, I KNOW! But you guys...it's really funny. I love all the actors and actresses. I've been showing it to my students here in China and they get a kick out of it. It's clean and funny and the writers have done a great job of creating a great culture of aliens...starting with naming them all after professional athletes!

The only thing that'd make this better is if it were Faith Hill and Carrie Underwood.

Nashville might be my most surprising show of the season. I never watched Friday Night Lights, but Connie Britton stole my heart in American Horror Story last year. So when I heard she was going to be on this show, even though I spent a really awful 10 months in Nashville, I decided to check it out. Britton is great and so is Hayden Panettiere, and they are doing their own singing. Elvis Costello and John Paul White from the Civil Wars are writing some of the songs, so the music is fabulous. I'm a sucker for a show about music, you know. But this one has rivalry, scandal, and historical music references. It's seriously good TV.

What TV shows have surprised you this season? 

Which ones bombed? Which ones are you loving?