The latest return of NBC’s Saturday Night Live, after another mini-break, was its least political show since returning from the writers’ strike. A lengthy sketch featuring Amy Poehler as Hillary Clinton opened the show – but after that, nothing. Not even any political jokes during “Weekend Update.”
    The kickoff skit, though, was lengthy, pointed and strong. Poehler, in a solo spot, was introduced as “the next President of the United States,” and explained her allegedly unavoidable victory as the eventual Democratic candidate as being due to three key reasons, which she enumerated and upon which she elaborated.
    “First, I am a sore loser,” she said, explaining that if Barack Obama won, she would support him only half-heartedly, to set up his loss in 2008 and her opp...Read More

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In Hear and Now, Ilene Taylor Brodsky’s loving but unflinching portrait of her deaf parents, we get a very close look – and an equally close listen – at a loving relationship that is about to test itself in a new way.

Both Paul and Sally Taylor were born deaf, and lived their lives without hearing a thing. They met and married as young adults, and have been together ever since, raising their daughter Ilene (who is not hearing-impaired) and surrounding themselves with loved ones, a comfy home, and the sound of silence.

Sally enjoys heavy-metal music while she drives, cranking the volume up high, but only because she can feel the vibrations. Paul, a professor and amateur inventor, has rigged up ...Read More

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 “He was shot to death the day before his 45th birthday on April 1, 1984 — by his own father. Everyone remembers the death of Marvin Gaye. And everyone remembers the music he made. But the life he lived isn't nearly as familiar. A new American Masters portrait, "Marvin Gaye: What's Going On," aims to fill in the gaps.” (Orlando Sun-Sentinel)

 

 “But knowing the destination doesn't have to spoil the journey, and thanks to Gaye, whose music here is tied effectively to the ups and downs of his nearly 45 years, it's a...Read More

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Of the 42 U.S. Presidents, the PBS documentary series American Experience has now profiled 15 of them. Tonight and tomorrow night, the series presents a two-part, four-hour biographical study of, and titled, George H.W. Bush.

Viewed in the context of 2008, the one-term Bush presidency of 1989-93 hits a lot of eerily familiar touchstones: a Gulf War, a recession, Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, concerns about global oil reserves and availability. But there’s also a lot here that’s viewed through a less familiar prism, including how Bush, no less than Ronald Reagan, deserves credit for ending the Cold War.

...Read More

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In the spirit of throwing anything against American Idol to see if it sticks, or at least to fill the hour, the CW tonight presents its newest reality series: Farmer Wants a Wife.

Not Farmer Gets a Wife, because that would promise some sort of resolution – and on CW, the network that searched for the next Pussycat Doll only to have the Doll say “Thanks, but no thanks,” it’s the journey, not the destination, that matters.

So here we have a new show that seems old, and overly familiar, from the start. Farmer Wants a Wife is the same show as Outback Jack, only without the Aussie accent. It’s the same p...Read More

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The last of the broadcast networks to do so, ABC last night fielded a lineup with all-new episodes of its Thursday night series. There was a birthday gone awry on Ugly Betty, a contest spun out of control on Grey’s Anatomy, and a whirlwind of jaw-dropping activity on Lost.

The best was saved for last. Grey’s had an interesting medical subplot, and Betty some sweet moments, but Lost just never let up for a second.

With Lost last night, we got to see how dangerous Ben, in a flash-forward, really is. On the island, in the series’ “present” timeline, we also saw his d...Read More

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The sixth post-strike installment of NBC’s Saturday Night Live opened with a lengthy lampoon of C-SPAN’s coverage of the Senate Foreign Relations hearing on Gen. David Petraeus’ report on Iraq. It was a skit that managed to include all three presidential candidate impersonations, yet they were upstaged during the skit, and upstaged shortly thereafter by an unannounced celebrity appearance.

The opening skit had Petraeus (Will Forte) grilled, in turn, by Sens. John McCain (Darrell Hammond), Hillary Clinton (Amy Poehler) and Barack Obama (Fred Armisen). Obama isn’t even a member of the committee, but was allowed to participate because, as the chairman explained...Read More

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Returning with its first post-strike episode, NBC’s 30 Rock doesn’t just come back in top form.  It hits the ground in full stride, more confident, audacious and laugh-out-loud funny than ever.

30 Rock opens with a fake NBC promo for a fake NBC show, one that 30 Rock has mentioned before, in an episode guest starring Jerry Seinfeld.  Many daily newspapers won’t even print the name of this show within a show, a jiggle-TV variant of Survivor – but since the NBC broadcast network has no problem enacting the ersatz show, as well as displaying its title and building a 30 Rock episode around it, it should be fair game her...Read More

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After three weeks off, NBC’s Saturday Night Live returned with frequent guest host Christopher Walken at the helm. (“This is my 100^th time hosting,” he said in his monologue, exaggerating a little more than slightly. “My centennial.”) It wasn’t as politically charged as recent SNL efforts – but overall, it was a lot funnier.

The opening skit featured Darrell Hammond as Bill Clinton and Amy Poehler as Hillary, discussing and defending their recent tax-return disclosures.  Poehler’s faux Hillary said that, because the nation now knew that she and her husband had amassed more than $100 million since leaving office, mostly from his speaking fees, she was announcing ...Read More

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There aren’t many shows on TV right now that can compete with the complexity of ABC’s Lost, or that have as many characters who are as nuanced and interesting, or that hand out as many shocking surprises, or that play so heavily in the sandbox of allegory. But there’s at least one: Sci Fi Channel’s Battlestar Galactica, which returns tonight to begin its fourth and final season.

Lost, this season, has been all about shaking up its own narrative. Before, we learned about characters in flashbacks, and the suspense centered around when, and if and how, the Oceanic plane-crash survivors would get off the island. But in last season’s cliffhanger finale, suddenly we were confronted with a fla...Read More

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Tonight’s return of NBC’s My Name Is Earl features lots of funny lines and good comic performances. It also features two things we didn’t need to see, and which, in this context, are so distractedly and awkwardly unamusing they almost serve as some sort of polar opposite of humor.

One is Paris Hilton, who shows up several times in Earl’s coma-induced sitcom fantasies to smile and say two words: her signature soliloquy, “That’s hot!” Compared to this massively promoted guest spot, Britney Spears’ recent turn on ...Read More

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The various British series featuring Gordon Ramsay bullying people, whether aspiring chefs or restaurant owners in dire need of advice, are a bit better and more understated than their American counterparts. That doesn’t mean, though, that this country’s versions don’t have their own tasty flavors. This is the fourth season of this Fox series – and each season, the wannabe cooks arrive with unjustifiable arrogance, only to have Ramsay take it away from them almost immediately. And this time, he’s got an extra-sneaky trick up his sleeve. (Or, more accurately...Read More

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