On Sunday night, NBC aired the film National Treasure featuring Nicolas Cage, Jon Voight, Harvey Keitel and a whole bunch of very competent actors I couldn’t point out in a crowd if my life depended upon it. And for the life of me, I wish I could remember the name of the blonde. Especially during the shopping mall dressing room scene. Hubba hubba.
On one hand, National Treasure was perhaps the most blatant product-placement fiesta ever offered in the history of Hollywood to the fraternal organizations known as The (Free)Masons and/or the Knights Templar. This is amazing because these organizations have long been rumored to be the secret force behind the aliens of Area 51 and Every Single Goddamned Reason Why Your Wife Won’t Have Sex With You, Even When You Don’t Come Home Really Fucked Up. But some awfully strange shit is rumored to happen with the Masons, especially if they’re wearing matching pinkie rings. So who am I to argue?

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Posted on September 2, 2008

By Kathryn Ware

Our look back on the debut season of Ironside continues.
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Episode 5: Eat, Drink and Be Buried
Airdate: 5 October 1967
Plot: After popular advice columnist Francesca Kirby (Lee Grant) is nearly kidnapped from her estate by the Creature from the Black Lagoon, her old friend Robert T. Ironside is called in to narrow the list of suspects.
This episode opens with what may well be the most laughable opening of any Ironside installment – no, make that any crime drama of the last 50 years. Don’t take my word for it; do yourself a favor and rent the DVD. The sight of Lee Grant in a blousy black-and-white print pantsuit sprinting up the side of a hill, fleeing from her wet-suit clad abductor, is a hilarious moment of vintage ’60s television.

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Posted on September 1, 2008

By Kathryn Ware

Our look back on the debut season of Ironside continues.
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Episode 4: Dead Man’s Tale
Airdate: 28 September 1967
Plot: This episode has a pre-credit opening worthy of The Sopranos. Warren Stuart, a middle-aged “big shot” “criminal” (“The No. 2 man in the organization”) and his much younger fiance Tina emerge from a large California split-level. They stroll arm-in-arm toward the gleaming turquoise swimming pool. After a cursory conversation in which the German beauty pouts when she learns Stuart is “sending (her) away” – because of “them” – Stuart tells her to go ahead and take her swim.
As soon as Tina and her three-foot-long blond braid are under the water, a sniper’s gun emerges from the trees, zeroes in on Stuart, and bang-bang, he’s a goner. Before he expires, Stuart tells his screaming fiance not to call the doctor, but to make “the other call first.” A dripping Tina grabs the avocado green poolside phone – an unintentional dramatic pause inserted while she dials the number on the rotary phone, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, dial-whirr, to call . . . Chief Ironside.

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Posted on August 25, 2008

By Kathryn Ware

Our look back on the debut season of Ironside continues.
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Episode 3: The Leaf in the Forest
Airdate: 21 September 1967
Plot: In a newspaper headline befitting the outbreak of World War III, the Bayside Strangler has hit again and Chief Robert T. Ironside is on the case. Five little old ladies have met their untimely ends, but something about the most recent murder doesn’t sit right with Ironside, who suspects a second killer has used the Strangler’s MO to disguise his own dastardly deed.

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Posted on August 19, 2008

By Kathryn Ware

Our look back on Ironside continues.
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Airdate: 14 September 1967
Title: Message From Beyond
Plot: It looks like an inside job when $175,000 is stolen from a horseracing track. Good thing Robert T. Ironside and his team of three (police officers Eve Whitefield and Ed Brown and the Chief’s bodyguard/driver Mark) just happen to be enjoying one of their semi-regular afternoons at the track when the power goes out and the cash is taken. Bad thing for Ironside that it happened just moments before he’s about to post his sure thing, big-money bet.

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Posted on August 11, 2008

By Kathryn Ware

Following my rundown of the amazing debut season of Maude, I’m ready to delve back into another iconic television series from my youth. As I write this, the disc I’ve received from Netflix is fresh out of its shipping envelope. Though my next foray into ’70s TV pop culture is only 15 minutes into the first episode, I’m already marveling at how well this program lives up to my high expectations.
Ironside is a crime drama that ran straight through my formative TV years, from 1967-1975. Long before I saw Raymond Burr’s performance as the creepy wife killer in Rear Window, I knew him as chief of detectives Robert T. Ironside, a 30-year veteran of the San Francisco police force confined to a wheelchair by a would-be assassin’s bullet in the first scene of the pilot episode.
Each week, Ironside solved a new case with his Mod-Squadesque team: Don Galloway as Ken-doll detective Ed Brown, Don Mitchell as Mark Sanger (Ironside’s African-American bodyguard with an attitude), and Barbara Anderson as the cool socialite-turned-policewoman Eve Whitfield. (“Yes, I’m one of those Whitfield’s,” she purrs to a team of reporters in her first scene.) In 1971, she was replaced by another mod-looking blond, Elizabeth Baur as Fran Belding.
I loved Ironside. My family gathered each week around our TV trays in front of the set, our evening meal (complete with iceberg wedge salad) perfectly timed to coincide with the electronic siren sound that kicked off Quincy Jones’ thrilling theme song.
Here’s my rundown of the “World Premiere” episode of Ironside. The highlights are many.

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Posted on August 1, 2008

By Steve Rhodes

Recent observations from more TV viewing than should be allowed even in a democracy.
1. I think those of us who have been fans from day one can all say we were disappointed with the opening episode of Mad Men’s second season. Maybe all the attention will spoil the show. I had a hard time grasping the plot lines or even what the hell the characters were saying. A head-scratcher – and not in a good way.
2. I watch a lot of “freak shows” on cable and find them to be compassionate and illuminating. The story of the half-man, half-tree broadcast recently was particularly moving.

Here is an update on the man’s condition.

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Posted on July 29, 2008

By The Special Guests Publicity Service

Concerned Pastor Says She’s Dealing ‘Spiritual Crack’
Yes, the devil is deceiving. But who would’ve thought he’d use the most beloved media mogul of our time – the queen of feel-good talk – Oprah Winfrey, as a tool.
For Pastor Bill Keller, the world’s leading Internet evangelist and founder of LivePrayer.com, there is no mistaking the danger of Winfrey’s submersion in and preaching of New Age theologies. According to Keller and many other evangelical Christians, it is a misguided path to hell, and far too many people are now walking it thanks to her.

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Posted on July 18, 2008

By Steve Rhodes

Recent observations from more TV viewing than should be allowed even in a democracy.
1. The sucker-punch wall is priceless.

I will defend to the death programming like this.

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Posted on July 8, 2008

By The Fair and Balanced Affairs Desk

A Fox News ad in Ad Age notes Bill O’Reilly’s dominance of the 8 p.m. (Eastern) time slot among cable news channels by reciting competitors that have come and gone from CNN and MSNBC while The O’Reilly Factor has stuck at No. 1 in the ratings for 90 consecutive months. Here is the list.
CNN:
* Newsstand
* The Point
* Live From . . .
* CNN Election Center
* Live From The Headlines
* Connie Chung Tonight
* Wolf Blitzer Reports

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Posted on July 1, 2008