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DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

Bianculli's Blog

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

The Cold Light Reader

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Dateline Donovan
Contributors

DAVID HINCKLEY

All Along the Watchtower

ED BARK

Uncle Barky's Bytes

ALEX STRACHAN

TV That Matters

MIKE HUGHES

Open Mike

ED MARTIN

Ed Martin's TV Mix

KIM AKASS

Aerial View

MONIQUE NAZARETH

MNtv

BILL BRIOUX

TV Feeds My Family

ROGER CATLIN

TV Eye

GARY EDGERTON

Must-Click TV

TOM BRINKMOELLER

Raised On MTM

GERALD JORDAN

Crossing Jordan

NOEL HOLSTON

The Grassy Noel

TVWW ARCHIVE

Contributors Archive
 
 
2014
Nov
29
SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE VINTAGE By David Bianculli
 
 
From 2004, this vintage episode features Ben Affleck as host, and N.E.R.D. as the musical guest. The draw, for watching this a decade later, is to catch two of today’s late-night talk hosts in their sketch-comedy roles: Jimmy Fallon trading Boston accents with Affleck, and Seth Meyers as a businessman in Bangkok dealing with an unwanted item in his hotel room: a dead hooker.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
29
THE GRAHAM NORTON SHOW By David Bianculli
 
 
Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman from Horrible Bosses 2 are here for this new installment of Norton’s freewheeling talk show – as is Dame Judi Dench, whose previous appearances here have been thoroughly delightful.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
29
1980: ABC BROUGHT 'BREAKING AWAY' TO TV By Christy Slewinski
 
 
On this day in 1980, ABC debuted its adaptation of the Academy Award-winning coming-of-age film, Breaking Away...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
1982: NBC PRESENTS MAILER'S 'THE EXECUTIONER'S SONG' By Christy Slewinski
 
 
On this day in 1982, NBC presented a made-for-TV version of Norman Mailer's Pulitzer Prize-winning true-life novel, The Executioner's Song...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
ROAD TO UTOPIA By David Bianculli
 
 
This is the last Friday in November, and thus the final installment of TCM’s “Road Movies” Friday TV tour. And tonight, the network shows three of the very best road movies, all in a row. Start at 8 p.m. ET with 1945’s Road to Utopia, which sends Bob Hope, Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour north to Alaska, and presents all the music, comedy, and fourth-wall-shattering nonsense that made these films so popular, and so quietly subversive. This showing also serves as a primer o
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
KRISTEN CHENOWETH: COMING HOME By David Bianculli
 
 
This musical special is the final edition of this year’s PBS Arts Fall Festival, and features series host Kristen Chenoweth in the spotlight, in her home town of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, featuring local singers and musicians who back her as she runs through the songs on her latest album.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS By David Bianculli
 
 
Another superb road movie presented tonight by TCM. This one, from 1942, is Preston Sturges’ marvelous examination of Hollywood, from the point of view of a director of light comedy films who yearns to do something darker – and embarks on a mission to travel with the “common people,” riding the rails and hitting the road to learn, and then reflect, the anxieties of the everyday man. Joel McCrae stars as the director, Veronica Lake co-stars as his eventual traveling compan
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
THE FOO FIGHTERS: SONIC HIGHWAYS By David Bianculli
 
 
This edition of Dave Grohl’s transcontinental trip down musical memory lane takes him to home turf: Seattle, where he looks back on the birth and tragic end of Nirvana, and the emotional formation of the Foo Fighters, who, with Grohl, write a song about their return visit to the city, and the recording studio where the Foo Fighters were formed. But older parts of music history are covered as well, including visits with Nancy Wilson of Heart and Larry Parypa of the Sonics.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
28
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT By David Bianculli
 
 
The first movie to sweep all the major Oscars, this 1934 Frank Capra stars Claudette Colbert as a runaway heiress, Clark Cable as the reporter on her trail (and in her bed, though with a divider in between them). All three won Oscars, along with screenwriter Robert Riskin and the film itself.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Nov
27
MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE By David Bianculli
 
 
A TV tradition, and a good one – as background visual wallpaper for the holiday, if nothing else. Happy Thanksgiving!
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'
By Ed Bark
 
 
 
 
Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver
By Christy Slewinski
 
 
 
 
'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy
By Noel Holston
 
 
 
 

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James
By Mike Hughes
 
 
 
 
For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self
By Monique Nazareth
 
 
 
 
Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption
By David Hinckley