SERIES PREMIERE: This new series is a missed opportunity – a TV series, based on a nonfiction book about the burgeoning standup comedy scene of the 1970s, rewritten and whitewashed as a fictional work featuring mostly composite characters. The major reason to watch also is the major reason this series should have played it straight, and fact-based: Melissa Leo is a marvel as Goldie, the tough-talking owner of an L.A. comedy club that serves as home base for a parade of aspiring young comics. But Leo’s Goldie, quite clearly, actually is modeled on Mitzi Shore, Pauly Shore’s mother and the owner of L.A.’s Comedy Store. David Letterman, Jay Leno, Robin Williams, Richard Pryor, Sam Kinison, Jim Carrey – they all came up through Mitzi’s center stage. But on I’m Dying Up Here, most of are “approximated,” and written in a way that only approximates a good TV series. Like HBO’s Vinyl, this is a great subject, and an era captured vividly in visual terms, that simply falls flat in terms of story and approach. If you watch, watch for Melissa Leo. This should have been Mitzi Shore’s story for real, with Leo dead center. Perhaps, something closer to Play Mitzi for Me…