This 1980 movie is a study in starmaking – and in scene-stealing. Yes, Chevy Chase walks around this golf course, and this comedy movie, like he owns the place. But the former Saturday Night Live player is outshone not only by veteran comic Rodney Dangerfield, but by Chase’s own SNL replacement, Bill Murray. Watch Murray to learn just how a bold and improvisational comedian can run away with a film – if he’s willing to gopher broke.

2019

Jun

DOG DAY AFTERNOON By David Bianculli

Speaking of actors and ad libs, this 1975 movie, based on a true-life bank robbery, features one of the all-time most electric ones. Al Pacino, completely in character as the unpredictable bank robber, feeds off the energy of the onlookers watching the on-location scene outside the Brooklyn bank, and begins and leads a chant of “Attica! Attica!,” referring to the recent prison rebellion. Great stuff. And, by the way, great movie. Sidney Lumet directs, and Pacino’s talented co-s

2019

Jun

THE SIXTIES By David Bianculli

CNN is repeating this documentary series tonight – many more hours than the network usually does, so it’s a convenient place to stock up on your 50-year-old memories. My favorite, from the opening episode (which is all about television of that decade), is the segment focusing on the Smothers Brothers. I’m not in that segment, if I recall correctly, but I am in other segments of the TV episode of The Sixties. And after all, isn’t not recalling correctly part of the appeal

2019

Jun

BLAZING SADDLES By David Bianculli

Mel Brooks made one brilliant comedy movie after another in 1974. (One was this film. The other was Young Frankenstein. Beat that creative double-header!) Blazing Saddles seems almost more brazen these days, because of our overall political correctness – but that makes it, somehow, even funnier with age. Richard Pryor worked on the script with Brooks, but Cleavon Little got to play the on-air role of black Bart – as opposed to Black Bart – opposite Gene Wilder.

2019

Jun

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. By David Bianculli

As science geeks turned heroic S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, Fitz and Jemma (Iain De Caestecker, Elizabeth Henstridge) have fallen in love, sworn to be together forever, then barely been together at all since, as their respective fates have thrown them into alternate universes and timelines. At the climax of last week’s show, they finally were about to be reunited – but as prisoners of aliens aboard a hostile spaceship. This week, the long-separated duo finally gets to share the screen &ndash

2019

Jun

JETT By David Bianculli

Last week’s series premiere of Jett had Carla Gugino, as former master thief Daisy “Jett” Kowalski, pulled back into a life of crime by a criminal mastermind – played by Giancarlo Esposito, who’s already proven his criminal-mastermind chops by starring on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul as Gus Fring. In Jett, he dispatches Jett to steal a diamond ring in the safe of another crime boss – which she accomplishes, with help from an accomplice. But at the very en

2019

Jun

REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER By David Bianculli

Bill Maher headlined his first show for HBO 30 years ago, in 1989. Then came his 1993 Comedy Central series Politically Incorrect, which moved to ABC late-night four years later. Until 2001, that is, when Maher made a post-9/11 remark that ABC considered so politically incorrect, the network fired him the following year. But the year after that, Maher was hired by HBO, where Real Time has been presented ever since. And tonight, he and his guests get to opine, comically and otherwise, on the

2019

Jun

THE GRAHAM NORTON SHOW By David Bianculli

James Corden just finished a strong week of shows broadcast from his former home town of London, where one of his show’s regular features, put on prime display, was his practice of bringing out each night’s celebrity guests at the same time, seated on the same couch and forced to both interact and listen. Tonight, you can watch the long-running U.K. talk show from which Corden cribbed the idea: The Graham Norton Show. Corden was a guest on that show in 2014, sitting on the same couch

2019

Jun

SEASON 2 OF 'RIVIERA' ARRIVES ON SUNDANCE NOW By David Hinckley

Given how far Riviera spilled over the top in its first season, it’s no surprise that Season 2 feels an apparent urge to go further...

2019

Jun

'IN THE DARK' FINALLY FINDS ITSELF AT THE END OF THE SEASON By Mike Hughes

Born with good intentions, fine actors, and poor pacing, In the Dark has wandered a bit. It seemed to be drifting, but not anymore...

Posts 921-930 of 1781

92 93 94 95 96

New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up

The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation

Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'

Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver

'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action

How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James

For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth

In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self

Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption