January 2011
19 posts
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Mrs. Show: The Women Behind a Comedy Classic →
Joe Berkowitz takes a closer look at the role of women in the classic Mr. Show:
Perhaps Mr. Show wasn’t as inclusive as a show ballsy enough to air a skit like “Mr. Show Boys Club” should have been. Some of its most hysterical sketches didn’t feature any female characters at all: “The Founding Fathers,” “Lie Detector,” “The Audition,” and “Pre-Taped Call-In Show,” to name a few. However, those...
Watchdanmeth:
NEW CARTOON!: Frank’s Netflix Tour My new cartoon for College Humor pushes your gross landlord Frank into the endless movie library that is Netflix. Big ups to Upright Citizens comedian Jim Santangeli for his authentic character-acting on this one! (He also killed it as the skull in my Ed Hardy spoof)
The Forgotten Brilliance of Popular →
Leila Cohan-Miccio takes a look at Popular, Glee creator Ryan Murphy’s forgotten WB show from the late 90’s:
Ten years before Glee, Ryan Murphy created Popular, a campy over-the-top comedy disguised as a typical teen drama. The show ostensibly revolved around two high school juniors: the beautiful and popular Brooke McQueen (played by the perpetually underrated Leslie Bibb) and the...
An Extended Interview with Former Colbert Report... →
Here’s an extended version of Mike Sacks’ interview with former Colbert head writer Allison Silverman from his book And Here’s the Kicker. Here’s a sample, on Colbert’s character:
Stephen is all about status and the trappings of power. This is a character who looks to be in charge, and he constantly feels threatened by people who have much less than he has. There’s...
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The Onion News Network's Spot-On Evisceration of...
Most people tuning into Friday’s premiere ofThe Onion News Network on IFC probably knew what to expect. For over 20 years, The Onion’s brand of print humor has made us laugh — and since 2006, we’ve enjoyed The Onion News Network’s online videos. In its newest incarnation, The ONN makes the leap to television and hits all the right strides.
Several of the show’s segments were released and...
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In Defense of Judd Apatow's Female Characters
I’m not going to lie: I’m pretty excited that Judd Apatow is working on another movie for Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann’s characters from Knocked Up. Some might be surprised by this: as I write this piece, I’m listening to a Liz Phair Pandora station, taking a break from writing an all-female sketch show, and preparing for a shoot tonight for a follow-up project to the web series about a feminist...
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A Sad, Slow Laugh Track: The Viewer, The Sitcom...
This week’s episode of How I Met Your Mother (“Last Words” 1/17/11) brought me to tears, and I loved every minute of it. I am not much of a crier, but when I see characters that I care about who make me laugh from week to week struggle with the emotional loss of a loved one, I get choked up. As the credits rolled and I dabbed my eyes and blew my nose, I thought of the other...
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Looking Back at Saturday Night Live, 1985-1990
When we last left Saturday Night Live, the show was in dire straights. Having repeatedly tried and failed to find a formula that worked following the departure of the original cast and crew of the show in 1980, by 1985 SNL was on the verge of cancellation. In response, NBC re-hired Lorne Michaels, hoping that he would be able to fix the clearly broken show. Unfortunately, Michaels’ return was...
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IFC's Big Comedy Push
Garry Shandling’s TV show host alter ego Larry Sanders would constantly admonish his audience with a direct order: “No flipping.” For a certain kind of viewer in 2011 (the kind who enjoys shows that are crazy funny and pitch-perfect), that command would be redundant if he or she were lucky enough to stumble upon reruns of The Larry Sanders Show on TV. That same viewer would probably also need no...
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Perfect Couples Recap: "Pilot"
Midseason, you guys! Where networks trot out their new shows and quietly dispose of underperforming ones like a veterinarian disappearing injured pets in the dead of night. The strange wisdom of shelving burgeoning hit Parks and Recreation to make way for Outsourced last fall sent indignant shockwaves throughout the nerd community, TV division. What was even stranger was the news that when Parks...
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The Office Recap: "Ultimatum"
“Bears sad, worms happy.”
Not much can happen in an episode all about lacking commitment, but at least The Office started 2011 with an honest attitude. And to fair-weather Office fans everywhere, listen up! Whether you lost interest after Pam and Jim married (turning Pam into this irritable, directionless older sister figure and turning Jim into such a tired guy he’s become...
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Parks and Recreation Recap: "Go Big or Go Home"
The wait is over. After an eight-month hiatus,Parks and Recreation is finally back. I hadn’t been born yet when the original Star Warstrilogy was released, but now I feel I know what fans went through waiting 20 years for the prequels… except for that whole “being completely devastated by the end results” thing. Unlike the Star Wars prequels, Parks and Rec’s third season is, so far, every bit as...
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Watching Some Like It Hot For the First Time
In The Finally Screenings, Alden Ford is watching movies that he really should have seen by now, but hasn’t for some reason.
I’m actually not sure how I managed to avoid seeing this week’s film. A household that forbade R-rated movies was naturally overflowing with G-rated black-and-white classics, and I’ve seen more than my share of them. Jack Lemmon, Gene Kelly, Katharine Hepburn. By...
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Searching for the Naturally Occurring Punchline
Contrary to the suspicions of a particularly desperate primary school teacher of mine, I do not suffer from Pseudobulbar Affect, a rare neurological disorder characterized by unprompted emotional outbreaks. The poor woman was hoping to control my raucous laughter, which had no discernible cause and regularly disrupted her lessons. Nothing is as controlling as a diagnosis. Other teachers simply...
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Modern Family Recap: “Caught In the Act”
While waiting to watch Modern Family, I caught the last few minutes of the show before it, Better with You. Holy crap is it terrible. The end credits had something to do with an old man and a dead cat, or something. It doesn’t really matter. What does matter is how the awfulness of Better with You made me appreciate the greatness of Modern Family.
In “Caught In the Act,” Gloria accidentally...
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Interview: Aziz Ansari Is Everywhere
Aziz Ansari has a lot going on this week: Parks and Recreation comes back for its critically acclaimed third season tonight, he’s doing reshoots for his first major movie role, and this Saturday, he comes to New York to play Carnegie Hall. Not a bad trio of things to be working on, especially when you’re only 27.
I talked to him about all of these projects as well as the scripts...