It would be a fool’s errand to try and argue that Mr. Nielsen’s greatest moments were not in “Airplane” and as Lt. Frank Drebbin in the “The Naked Gun” and the “Police Squad!” series that preceded it. But, with everyone else saluting those amazing deadpan moments now that Leslie Nielsen has sadly left us at age 84, I thought I’d take a moment to take two somewhat less well known moments from his early, less funny movies.
First, before Captains Kirk and Reynolds and Han Solo, there was the not-so-dissimilar Commander J.J. Adams in “Forbidden Planet.”
And here is Nielsen in what honestly really is, in its way, an amazing pre-Zucker Brothers performance by Nielsen. In 1977’s “Day of the Animals” he portrayed an ad man who takes over one faction of an extremely ill-starred group of campers. Below, he indulges in some poor behavior even Sterling Cooper wouldn’t have tolerated.
And, because it’s mandatory, a brief moment of sheer genius from “The Naked Gun.”
As the press day began for director Nigel Cole and writer William Ivory’s amiable historical comedy, we assembled entertainment writers believed we’d be doing separate roundtable interviews with the film’s best known actresses. When Sally Hawkins and Miranda Richardson entered the room together to promote “Made in Dagenham,” about a 1968 strike by female workers at a Ford plant located in a grimy London suburb, however, it was easy to be a little overwhelmed. Either one of them is worthy of a Russian novel’s worth of questions and our time would be limited.
Like so many first-class English actors of her generation, Miranda Richardson is known for her ability to play all ends of the dramatic spectrum. In England, and certain geekier quarters of the U.S., she’s still extremely well known known for her work alongside Rowan Atkinson and Stephen Fry as “Queenie” (i.e. Queen Elizabeth I) and assorted other characters on Richard Curtis and Ben Elton’s historical cult-com, “Black Adder.” Younger geeks, however, might know her better as magical tabloid journalist Rita Skeeter in the Harry Potter films. On the more realistic end of the spectrum, she has also done magnificent work playing a ruthless IRA operative in “The Crying Game,” a maltreated housewife in an Oscar-nominated role in Louis Malle’s “Damage,” a widely praised turn in the Oscar-winning “The Hours,” and a widow investigating her husband’s death on AMC’s recently canceled suspense drama, “Rubicon.” On the other hand, she’s also portrayed the character of Mrs. Santa Claus opposite Paul Giamatti‘s Santa in “Fred Claus.” Despite some resemblance, both physically and in terms of talent, she is not part of the famed Redgrave acting dynasty and no relation to the late Natasha Richardson. She is, in fact, the only actor in her family, which perhaps makes her all the more impressive.
Although Sally Hawkins has appeared in some 34 movie and TV productions since 1999, she broke into the consciousness of most of her fans with her Golden Globe winning performance in Mike Leigh’s 2008 “Happy-Go-Lucky,” in which she dominated the film as a relentlessly happy and, strangely enough, rather bright, elementary school teacher. It was probably an ideal role for a woman who really does come across as cheerful in person, with an approachable demeanor that certainly seems to fit the child of two children’s books authors. Currently starring on Broadway in a new production of George Bernard Shaw’s “Mrs. Warren’s Profession,” Hawkins has continued to mix starring roles with a number of smaller supporting appearances, including a turn in Cary Fukunaga’s highly-anticipated new version of “Jane Eyre.” Her next leading role is as Irish radical politician and activist Bernadette Devlin in “The Roaring Girl” — assuming the real Devlin is not successful in her efforts to prevent the film from being made.
When it comes to TBS’s original programming, I was never afraid to indicate my disappointment with the way the network perpetually left the late, great “My Boys” floundering on their schedule without any other series that matched its comedic tone, and having watched the pilot for their new series, “Glory Daze,” an hour-long comedy which looks at life in college circa 1986, I have an immediate fear that I could well see history repeat itself…and that would be very disappointing, indeed.
Not that it’s necessarily the most original concept in the world, you understand. Even if you were to set aside the not-insignificant number of college-life movies that exist, from “Animal House” and “Back to School” to “Van Wilder” and “Old School,” you’d still have several top-notch TV series which have tackled the same topic, including “Greek,” “Undeclared,” and…wait, “The Paper Chase”? Who put that in here?
Well, anyway, you get my point: “Glory Daze” is not the first show about college to come down the pike…and, yet, I was immediately intrigued by the twist of having the show take place in 1986. I admit, the predominant reason it intrigues me is because I actually started college in the fall of ’87 (although if I find out that at least half of the writing isn’t over the age of 40, I shall disassociate myself from the program post-haste). That, and the fact that I heard “Make a Circuit with Me” by the Polecats played during the pilot, which earned the show some serious street-cred points.
Here’s what TBS’s press release on the show has to say:
Big hair, New Wave music and acid-wash jeans – TBS is returning to 1986 fo the new, one-hour comedy series “Glory Daze.” Set on an Indiana college campus, “Glory Daze” features a cast fresh faces, including Kelly Blatz (“Aaron Stone”), Callard Harris (“Sons of Anarchy”), Matt Bush (“High School”), Drew Seeley (“Freshman Father”), Hartley Sawyer (“Killian”), and Julianna Guill (“My Alibi”). Tim Meadows (“Saturday Night Live,” “Mean Girls”) also stars as a recently divorced, very liberal professor with a chip on his shoulder.
“Glory Days” premieres on TBS Tuesday, November 16, at 10 PM (EST / PST). “Glory Days” follows the fun – and awkward – misadventures of four freshmen as they navigate college life, trying to figure out who they are and who they want to be. Joel (Blatz) is a typical guy next door who is determined to keep his focus on pre-med, at least until he meets his unattainable dream girl, Christie (Guill). Eli (Bush) is a virgin who desperately wants to be cool. Jason (Seeley) is a buttoned-down conservative, attached at the hip to his preppy girlfriend. Brian (Sawyer) is a star baseball player strugglign to get out of his father’s shadow. Together, the guys agree to check out fraternity houses, finally coming to the steps of Omega Sigma, where they are greeted by pledge recruiter Reno (Harris). Intrigued by the fraternity’s cool factor, their fate is sealed. They begin a journey that will make a lifetime of memories.
Yeah, I have a bad feeling that the show could well slip into the trap of making too many jokes about things that haven’t yet happened – there’s already been a moment where two students make disparaging comments about the concept of “electronic mail” – but having just suffered through the excruciating experience of watching “Blue Mountain State: Season One,” I am hard pressed to dismiss any college show which appears to be more interested in focusing on the bonds of friendship rather than sex, drugs, and binge drinking.
Not that there won’t be plenty of all of those things going on in “Glory Daze,” too. I mean, hell, it is a show about college.
And speaking of that, now it’s your turn to participate: what are some of your own favorite college memories? Leave ’em in the comments section below…and, remember, you get bonus points if the memories in question originally took place between the years 1986 and 1991!
Between the piecemeal volume sets and the “Star Wars” parody episodes, Fox has made a mint screwing over the fans of “Family Guy.” You know, the ones that helped bring it back from cancellation? And apparently, they’re not afraid to admit it, because it takes pretty big balls to release a 23-minute episode on DVD just because it never aired on TV. The episode in question, “Partial Terms of Endearment,” was supposedly deemed too controversial by Fox and pulled from their schedule. But after watching the episode – which finds Lois agreeing to be a surrogate mother for a couple, only to consider abortion after they’re killed in a car accident days after conception – it’s really not as bad as you’d think. In fact, I wouldn’t put it past Fox to have created the media frenzy themselves just so they could put out a DVD.
It’s hard to imagine anyone paying $10 for a single episode (especially when they could have easily included it in the next volume set as a bonus), which is too bad, because it’s one of the funnier episodes in years, with an awesome Road Runner/Wile E. Coyote gag and lines like “Wow, thanks a lot for 9/11, abortion enthusiasts!” The addition of extras like an audio commentary, a live table read, and “Seth & Alex’s Almost Live Comedy Show” is supposed to make you feel better about the high price tag, but it won’t. Rent it from Netflix or, if you absolutely must, find it online for free.
During the Winter TCA Tour in January 2010, I had a chance to talk to Bob Odenkirk about his work on “Breaking Bad,” but before our conversation was over, I had to ask the question that I knew “Mr. Show” fans – and I include myself in that number – were chomping at the bit to have answered: is there still a chance that Bob and his longtime cohort David Cross would work together again.
“Oh, yeah, we’re going to do something together,” Bob assured me. “Absolutely. There is no question. We started writing a live show two weeks ago when he was here. We want to do another live show. Maybe in a year or a year and a half. My kids are older now so I can leave, so we can do a live tour. It’ll be really fun, yeah.”
In early August, during the Summer TCA Tour, I was fortunate enough to run into David, busy promoting his new IFC series, “The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret.” Not one to miss a chance for an update, I told him what Bob had said in January, and I asked for an update.
“See, I have very little responsibilities outside of a dog,” explained David. “But (Bob) has two kids and a wife. And, also, he has no balls. So when you combine all those things, it’s not good. But I put together a calendar for a way we could do a tour in which he would make money, he would be able to go home…I can’t remember offhand, but I think he would be able to go home for four days every ten days, or something like that.
“It would be a six-week tour, and I said, ‘Here, present this to whoever needs to sign off on it.’ I was, like, ‘You can’t ask for better than this. We’re going to suffer. We’re not going to make as much money, and we’re going to be away longer than we normally would be, but it’s in order to make it so that you can go home and so that these things that you need to address are addressed satisfactorily.’ I would love to do it. I am not the guy holding up the tour. It’s not me.”
So if David’s not the problem, then the problem must be Bob, right?
Time to drop a line back to the Odenkirk camp.
“I love David Cross,” Bob assured me by E-mail once he’d read David’s comments. “I think he’s funny and I consider him one of my best friends. But, sadly, he’s a liar. He is the one with family…two of ’em – but don’t tell either about the other!
“Plus, he claims to have Philatellaphobia – the fear of collecting stamps, which he claims keeps him stuck in the basement of his house, quaking and pooping. I would love to tour. I am standing outside my bachelor condo right now with a packed bag and a stash bag for my cocaine fixes. Oh, and I have no balls.”
So if both Bob and David are both claiming to be ready, does that mean that the tour is a go?
Hell, your guess is as good as mine. But at the very least, we’re getting some good comedy out of the discussion process.
In the meantime, though, enjoy this look back at the Bob and David experience before there even was a “Mr. Show,” and let us keep our fingers crossed that we’ll see them on a stage again in the very near future.
