Category: External TV (Page 136 of 419)

Rich Sommer is one of TV’s happiest “Mad Men”

August 10, 2009 /

As any television fan worth his salt knows, the new season of “Mad Men” is just around the corner — and if you’re a fan of the series, you’ll be happy to know that Bullz-Eye’s Will Harris just so happens to have had a chat with series star Rich Sommer recently. It will come as no surprise that the ever-intrepid Harris tried to pry some tidbits about the upcoming season out of Sommer…and it should be equally unsurprising that Sommer, not wanting to run afoul of show producer Matt Weiner, begged off, saying “You might be able to get that out of someone else, but I can’t be the guy, because I have a good relationship with Matt Weiner…and I’ve got to keep it that way!”

Of course, even if he wasn’t leery of breaking Weiner’s trust, Sommer might not be able to tell us what to look for. As he says in the interview, that kind of information doesn’t exactly flow freely on the “Mad Men” set:

Matt (Weiner) is a little bit impish and likes to sort of tease you with things. Like, in the first season, when Harry was going to sleep with Hildy, he sort of would tease me and say, ‘Oh, you’ve got a little story coming up in a couple of episodes.’ I would say, ‘Oh, that’s awesome. What is it?’ He would say, ‘You have to guess.’

Okay, so you won’t find any “Mad Men” spoilers — but that doesn’t mean Sommer’s Bullz-Eye interview is a bore. Far from it: Over the course of two discussions with Will, he discusses life behind the scenes of one of television’s best-reviewed series, reflects on his other high-profile gigs (The Devil Wears Prada, The Office), and provides some perspective on how he went from endless fruitless auditions to a steady job on the boob tube:

It was my final audition of the pilot season. It had been three miserable, horrible months where I had zero callbacks, zero positive reception, one of those pilot seasons that makes you pretty sure you are never going to be an actor and never want to be an actor. And then that happened.

To read the rest of the interview, just follow this link!

Actors, External TV, Interviews

True Blood 2.8 – Having Her On My Brain’s Like Getting Hit By A Train

August 10, 2009 /

First off, my apologies for the delay in getting this week’s blog onto the site. If you’ve been following my various posts on Premium Hollywood over the course of the past two weeks, then you know that I’ve been out in Pasadena for the Television Critics Association press tour. The festivities wrapped up on Saturday night, and I spent the majority of Sunday traveling home to Virginia, and when I got there, I must admit that seeing my wife and daughter again took precedent over watching “True Blood,” and even after my daughter went to bed, any desire to watch this week’s episode with my wife was conquered by an undeniable need to sleep. I’m still feeling way off my game, thanks to the wonders of jetlag, but I’ve finally had a chance to watch last night’s episode. My apologies, however, if things aren’t in-depth this time around as usual.

This was a Godric-heavy episode, the first we’ve ever had, and it was nice to see this mysterious character we’ve heard so much about become more fleshed out. Despite everyone giving us the impression that he was this old-school bad-ass of a vampire, it turns out that he’s actually more thoughtful than any of the vamps we’ve seen to date, having become highly interested in the possibilities of a vampire / human alliance. I always seem to be let down whenever I have high hopes for characters on this show, but it would be nice to think that he’s shaping up to be the Martin Luther King of his people. Between his ending of the battle in the church, giving Hugo a reprieve, and giving Lorena that smackdown at the party, he just spent the episode getting more and more awesome.

Jason had a lot of good material in this week’s episode, from his stupidity (I had to pause the TiVo until after I stopped laughing about his response when Sarah told him he was worse than Judas: “Why, what’d he do to you?”) to his attempt to bluff his way through the lockdown (“”I’m a cadet with the Light of Day Institute, I’m strapped”) to his smackdown of Reverend Steve (“I reckon I’ve been to Heaven: I’ve been inside your wife”), but let us not forget that he was also responsible for doling out one of the most awkward hugs in recent TV history. Kudos to Bill for taking it in the spirit in which it was intended, even if he couldn’t muster much post-hug enthusiasm. It looks like the Jason / Erik relationship is also burgeoning, so I’ll be curious to see where that goes in future episodes.

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External Entertainment, External TV, Reviews, True Blood, TV, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

Entourage 6.5 – Fore!

August 9, 2009 /

There are good filler episodes, and then there are bad filler episodes. Last week definitely fell into the former category, and although I assumed that this week’s show would belong to the latter, I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised. There wasn’t a whole lot going on tonight with everyone involved in the charity golf tournament in some form, but it was the hardest I’ve laughed at an episode of “Entourage” in quite awhile.

Since there was only a little bit of actual plot development this time around, let’s get that out of the way first. Eric may be the only character this season who’s actually getting a proper story arc, but it’s been entertaining thus far. Now that he’s dating Ashley, Eric is a little weirded out about seeing Sloan at the tournament, but when she informs him that he’s been paired with Hollywood bigwig Maury Barrinson at his request, Eric’s interest is perked. As it turns out, Maury is actually scouting Eric to come work for his company, and though it sounds like a promising opportunity, he turns it down when he learns that it was Sloan’s idea. For some reason, Eric believes that he’s being treated like a charity case, and while I understand where he’s coming from, he should know by the now that she’s only doing it as a friend. Unfortunately, Eric still sees her as an ex-girlfriend, which only means one thing: these two are going to get back together real soon. Sorry Ashley, but this was never a battle you were going to win.

Meanwhile, Vince and Drama are paired up with Mark Wahlberg and Tom Brady, and Wahlberg is having a field day teasing Drama about his surprisingly high handicap. Drama, looking for a little retribution, suggests a friendly little bet between them, only to slice his first drive into the trees. Drama’s day doesn’t get any better from there, either, and he eventually breaks Brady’s driver (which the Super Bowl MVP had just let him borrow) in a fit of rage. You’d think Turtle would be crying in joy after declaring his hatred for Brady (he even plans to tell the Patriots quarterback that he sucks balls, much to the behest of Jamie-Lynn), but that was before Brady invited Turtle over to his house to have dinner with Giselle. You can call him a sellout if you like, but you know you’d do the exact same thing.

By far the funniest pairing of the night, however, was Ari and Jeffrey Tambor – and for once, it wasn’t because of Jeremy Piven. Tambor was absolutely hilarious in his second guest spot to date as he cheated every chance he got in an attempt to impress his kids. Just watching him cut up the green was funny – especially while Ari was busy stressing out about his wife’s unhappy reaction to him keeping knowledge of Andrew’s affair from her. Of course, there’s no way this argument is over yet, despite Ari buying her a brand new Maserati. Still, for as much as Piven has proven the show’s savior these last few weeks, Tambor single-handedly stole the show in his response to his kids’ explicit-laced complaints about being bored: “Hey, this is a family day. So shut the fuck up and hit the ball.”

Actors, Celebrities, Entourage, External TV, TV, TV Comedies

One last TCA Televisionary Movie Moment

August 9, 2009 /

Since the TCA wraps today, I though I’d also wrap up my series of television related clips with the most obvious possible movie moment about the power of television, from the most obvious possible television related movie.

Ladies and gentlemen, with the cooperation of Paddy Chayefsky and Sidney Lumet, Peter Finch as Howard Beale is terribly irked, and he is no longer going to accept the usual state of affairs. In other words…

Actors, External Entertainment, External Movies, External TV, Movie Dramas, Movies, TV

TCA Tour: “Fringe”

August 8, 2009 /

Fox’s “Fringe” premiered last season to a ridiculous amount of buzz, thanks to the combination of J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, and Roberto Orci, a trio whose various credits (many of them shared) – “Alias,” “Lost,” “Mission: Impossible III,” “Transformers,” and the then-still-forthcoming “Star Trek” – were more than sufficient to get the sci-fi fanboys into a tizzy. Things may have started off a bit rocky, mostly due to a slight uncertainty about exactly what the hell was going on, but by the close of the season finale, when we found ourselves barely getting over that guest appearance by Leonard Nimoy before we found ourselves looking at a still-standing World Trade Center, we were already ready for Season 2 to begin.

“As we went along, I think we got a better handle on the balance of our characters and the plots and making sure that our plots were character-centric,” admitted executive producer Jeff Pinkner. “I think that we learned how to write for these actors, these characters over time, and I think we learned this in ‘Alias’ and ‘Lost.’ The shows that are really about the characters, the characters and the actors playing them start to meld a little bit more, and I think we’ve gotten better at that.”

Orci noted that one of the series’ biggest issue from the very beginning was figuring out the percentage of standalone episodes versus a larger serialization. “We’ve all read the research that says a regular viewer watches three episodes in a year, etcetera, etcetera, so you try to modulate,” he explained. “In the first season, we actually had to sort of plan around resetting the series once or twice and doing it around three- or four-week-long breaks. And that kind of exercise makes us, in Season Two, a little more flexible, a little bit more able to read the green. And I think, you know, the fact that we are closer than we were from New York is also helpful. We can all be up there a little bit more; we can communicate better with each other. I think we’re just a tighter ship this year.”

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External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Interviews, News, TCA Blog 2009, TCA Press Tour, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

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