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5 questions with Tom Pizzica of Food Network’s Outrageous Food

November 1, 2010 /


Photo courtesy of Food Network

Even though he finished as one of the runners-up in this season’s “Next Food Network Star” to Aarti Sequeira, Tom Pizzica knew he had the talent to have his own show, anyway. So did yours truly, because Pizzica has a Guy Fieri-like charisma about him. He also took more chances on the show than anyone I’d seen before, and it’s hard not to respect him for that.

Well, sure enough, Pizzica did get offered his own show on Food Network, and “Outrageous Food” airs this Friday at 10pm ET/PT. The show is about Pizzica being “on a quest to unearth the most jaw-dropping, eye-popping, occasionally heart-stopping foods in the country – dishes that give “outrageous” a whole new meaning.”

We had the opportunity to ask Pizzica a few questions about his upcoming show:

Premium Hollywood: How soon after you came in second place on “Next Food Network Star” did they contact you about having your own show anyway?

Tom Pizzica: I started shooting “Outrageous Food” shortly after “The Next Food Network Star” finished airing. Aarti’s show was already on and doing very well, and the network decided to move forward with me on this great new project.

PH: The premise of this show is awesome. How much hand do you have in selecting venues and episodes?

TP: The selection of locations is a collaboration between Food Network, Page Productions (my production company, who also produced “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives”), and me. There are many outrageous places to highlight across the country, and this season features a great group. I am excited about all of them!

PH: What has been the craziest outrageous food episode so far and why?

TP: There have been so many categories of outrageous food on this season, it’s hard to pick just one. A few that stand out: Outlaw Catering, the 105-pound burger, and the $175 burger at Wall Street Burger Shoppe.

PH: I feel like you may wind up as the networks’ next Guy Fieri. I’m sure a lot of folks agree with me. What goals do you have personally?

TP: My goal is to see “Outrageous Food” go on for many more seasons and hopefully even have other shows on Food Network. This is such a great opportunity, and I am thrilled to have it!

PH: Tell us in a couple of sentences why folks should watch this new show and what they can expect.

TP: “Outrageous Food” will blow your mind – it’s the craziest food I have ever seen. You will meet engaging and entertaining characters at each location; it’s going to be mayhem!

“Outrageous Food” airs this coming Friday, November 5 at 10pm ET/PT on Food Network.

External TV, The Next Food Network Star, TV

Does Nikki Finke know about this?

November 1, 2010 /

Just a bit of post-Halloween cheer directed in high style by Greg Nicotero with some fun cameos by Frank Darabont, Eli Roth, and comedy writer/stand-up comic Dana Gould as the Wolf Man. As you can read in the interview with Nicotero we posted Saturday, he’s the effects maestro responsible for the gore and what not on AMC and Frank Darabont’s “The Walking Dead,” which may be responsible for my either fleeing from the show out of my notorious squeamishness or becoming an alcoholic regular viewer. Fortunately, our own Jason Zingale is able to watch the thing stone cold sober, I believe, and just started blogging the show regularly.

As AICN’s Quint notes, Nicotero — whose responsible for all kinds of brilliant effects work in all kinds of movies and now on television — is the real deal when it comes to geekitude. We salute him.

External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Humor, Movie Comedies, Movies, The Walking Dead, TV

The Walking Dead 1.1 – Days Gone Bye

October 31, 2010 /

ALSO: Check out our interviews with author Robert Kirkman, director Frank Darabont, producer Gale Anne Hurd, and stars Andrew Lincoln, Jon Berthnal, Sarah Wayne Callies, Laurie Holden, Steve Yuen and Norman Reedus.

I’ve been aware of Robert Kirkman’s “The Walking Dead” for quite some time now, but I was always hesitant to read it because the idea of a zombie comic that never ended seemed boring as hell. Turns out it was the complete opposite. After AMC announced that they had commissioned a pilot based on Kirkman’s book (and directed by Frank Darabont, no less), I finally decided to give it a try, only to end up tearing through the 60-plus issues in a matter of months. Suffice it to say, I was hooked, and have been a dedicated reader ever since. It also changed my feelings about the upcoming television series, however, as I was now inclined to be somewhat protective of the source material. But after watching the pilot episode, it’s clear that fans won’t have to worry too much, because “The Walking Dead” is not only in good hands, but it translates perfectly to TV.

The show didn’t waste any time in setting its graphic tone, either, with sheriff Rick Grimes shooting a little zombie girl in the head while out searching for gas. Of course, the world wasn’t always swarming with the walking dead, and we get an appropriate flashback to the days before the zombie outbreak when Rick was just a normal police officer alongside his partner and best friend Shane. But after Rick gets shot in a firefight and falls into a coma in the hospital, he awakes weeks later to discover he’s all alone. The hospital is completely empty save for a few dead bodies lying on the ground, and when he goes outside, there are piles of carcasses all over the place. An unsettling sight for sure, but not nearly as frightening as seeing a decayed upper torso that’s still crawling around on the ground.

the_walking_dead_1-1

If Rick doesn’t seem that concerned with figuring out how a dead person can still be alive, it’s because all he cares about at the moment is making sure his wife Lori and son Carl are still safe. But there’s no sign of them at their house, and before he can look anywhere else, he gets a shovel straight to the face, knocking him unconscious. When he comes to, Rick finds himself tied to a bed post and in the company of a man named Morgan (the always awesome Lennie James) and his son Duane, who are immediately concerned that his bandaged wound is more than just the gunshot he claims it to be. Rick eventually convinces them that he’s not only still human, but has no idea what’s going on, so Morgan fills him in on the basics: people are dying and coming back to life (whom he refers to as “walkers”), and the only way to kill them is by hitting or shooting them in the head. But gunshots make noise, and noise attracts walkers – hordes of them, in fact, including Morgan’s dead wife, who continues to haunt him and his son by roaming outside the house where they’ve set up camp.

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External TV, The Walking Dead, TV, TV Dramas

Boardwalk Empire 1.7 – Daddy Issues

October 31, 2010 /

I feel like I have to start off this week’s write-up by noting that, as a result of having been watching the show via advance screeners that I received way back in August, this week is the first time that I’ve ever actually seen the opening credits of “Boardwalk Empire…and, hey, they’re pretty awesome! I particularly dug the shot of the ocean filled with bobbing bottles. And as far as the theme song goes, I was briefly convinced that I was hearing an instrumental portion from Donovan’s “Season of the Witch,” but, no, it’s The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s “Straight Up and Down.” Fair enough.

Things start out in Chicago, with a cop keeping close tabs on a gentleman indulging in a bit of corned beef hash and eggs. Bad news for him: turns out the cop is one of Capone’s informants. Worse news: I didn’t recognize him at first, but he’s the son of a bitch who slashed Pearl. How nice of Al to help Jimmy extract his revenge. I had no idea he was so sentimental. Now that they know where they can find the bastard, Jimmy heads over to the doctor to get his leg checked out (it’s the one that was wounded during WWI), since it’s been giving him trouble, describing the pain as “a dull ache inside.” A la the medical history lesson we got from Margaret’s pamphlet last week, this time we find out about Dr. Robert S. Woodworth and his so-called “Personal Inventory Test.” Jimmy agrees to take the test, though he’s clearly skeptical of its worth, but then he sees a guy who’s lost an eye and is wearing a colostomy bag. Surely he thinks the same thing we do: it could’ve been a hell of a lot better off.

Who’s the eccentric old codger in the bathrobe, wielding a fireplace poker? Shit, is that Nucky and Eli’s dad? Sure is. All the money Nucky’s got up his sleeve, and this is how his father lives…? Looks like the old man has a reason for preferring Eli…and not just because he was the first son to arrive on the scene after his accident. After Eli makes sure that his pops is in safe hands, he sets onto Nucky for seeing Margaret, reminding him between the lines that he was directly responsible for putting Margaret on the market by making her a widow. Nucky assures him it’s not an issue (though you know it will be one of these days), then shifts the subject back to their father, suggesting they put him in a home. Eli nixes the idea and, after Nucky dismisses any possibility of paying for a live-in nurse, suggests that he and his family can take him in, thereby underlining further why he’s Daddy’s favorite, but it’s the moment where an annoyed Nucky muses on how much the toaster cost ($9) and how it was never used that’s the more telling: Nucky wants to show off his wealth on his own terms, and he’s pissed when his gestures aren’t appreciated.

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Boardwalk Empire, External Entertainment, External TV, Reviews, TV, TV Dramas

Weekend box office: “Saw 3D” tortures its way to the top

October 31, 2010 /

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Even given my low information preview Thursday night, there really weren’t any big surprises this Halloween weekend as the seventh installment in the “Saw” series, but the first in 3D and therefore logically entitled “Saw 3D,” extracted a healthy but far from huge sum from audiences. The amount was an estimated $22.5 million for Lionsgate if you believe Box Office Mojo and the Playlist, or $24.2 million if you believe Nikki Finke and Anthony D’Alessandro. D’Allesandro, as usual guest/co-blogging with Anne Thompson, also tells us that it really does appear that 3D drove this film to its modest success, with 92% of tickets being sold for “digital hubs,” which I assume translates into 3D screens.

I wonder if that means the film will pay a commensurate price in home video for at least as long as home 3D remains rare. It’s also worth noting that the $20 million budget — modest by Hollywood standards but large by horror film standards — is double that of the prior films and the take is about $10 million below the opening weekends of the series at its peak. Still, making back your budget on opening weekend is never bad.

“Saw 3D” merited a B- on Cinemascore and apparently gave series fans what they want (misery, and lots of it, I gather), though their numbers be diminishing. Now that some of them have finally seen it, what critics want, however, is for the series to end with the  film currently getting drubbed by all but one scribe on Rotten Tomatoes. EW‘s Owen Gleiberman‘s more positive review is less a good review and more a bit of a confession — even the gore hardened critic had to turn away from the screen at one point or risk becoming physically ill — and a rumination on whether it’s even appropriate to enjoy a movie that sounds so invested in human pain that it should never have been allowed anything remotely short of an NC-17. (Which should not be seen as punitive or a a box office kiss of death, but let’s not open that can of worms right now, except that I just did.)

Helen Mirren, Bruce Willis, and Morgan Freeman look relieved in Moving right along in a relatively slow weekend with competition for people’s time heavy from the holiday, the election, and maybe even Jon Stewart’s rally, last week’s much less physically aggressive horror hit, “Paranormal Activity 2,” endured a very usual second-week horror drop  of just under 60% that still left enough for an estimated $16.5 million in the #2 spot. The leggy action-comedy “RED” was #3 with an estimate of $10.8 million and change. And “#4 “Jackass 3D” is predictably sinking like a stone at $8.425 million. However, it started at such a profitable point it actually crossed the $100 million mark in its third week. There are no tears at Paramount.

In limited release, the week’s two highest per-theater takes was as art-house as art-house gets. The single theater showing “Waste Land,” a documentary about Brazilian trash-gatherer/artists, earned a hefty $11,600 estimate over it’s weekend. Meanwhile, the two venues final thriller directed by the late Claude Chabrol “Inspector Bellamy” starring Gérard Depardieu, raked in a very healthy estimated $11,200.  This one is on my list.

Documentaries, External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Movie Comedies, Movie Dramas, Movies, News

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