Tuesday's Forgotten TV: THE FIRST CHURCHILLS

In 1971, MASTERPIECE THEATER began it 43 year run with THE FIRST CHURCHILLS, a BBC costume drama based on Winston Churchills' family memoir. I remember being filled with excitement about this 12 part series, one of the first tastes of British TV I had had.  It was perhaps the only TV show that academics would admit watching.

If you look at the first few seasons of the show, most series were based on great works of literature: James, Balzac, Dickens, Zola, Collins, Wharton. It was not until UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS perhaps that they reached out to a broader audience and offered, what seemed at the time, a more raucous story.

As you can see, these were not lavish productions even by the standard of the day. But you could watch TV believing you were being educated as well as entertained if that made a difference to you.

After several seasons, I found that no matter what book the series did, who the author was, the results were fairly similar and static. They all had much the same look to them and much the same sort of characters. I am sure it is me who was lacking and not the series. The introduction of MASTERPIECE MYSTERY added a new ingredient, but the results are often too similar in tone for me. A writer's style is lost as the same production teams, directors, set designers, etc, take hold of them and give them the BBC feel.

I am sorry to offend and clearly most US series are inferior to what we find here. But I can't help but think it could be better.


Here is a list of all the series, they did. 

Engaging Twosomes

THE NYT looked at some of the TV shows where two people clicked in a big way, thus making the show a stronger one. Most of their examples were recent, but looking back, what twosomes (not necessarily romantic) really make a show zing. Here are three for me.

Andy Taylor and Barney Fife on THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW. Don Knotts and Andy Griffin had chemistry. You believed in their friendship from their first scenes together. Barney was a screw-up but there was nothing he wouldn't do for the Taylor family. And Andy covered up a million of Barney's goofs over the years. They played like a well-oiled machine.

Tami and Eric Taylor, played by Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton on FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS anchored a constantly changing cast of teenagers. Romances might come and go, teams might graduate and move on, but they were the rock solid totally believable heart of the show. Who didn't want parents like them?

Lorelai and Rory Gilmour (Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel) on THE GILMOUR GIRLS were perhaps the first mother-daughter team to even have their own patter. Although they had moments of disagreement, you never doubted they loved each other and it was this bond that carried the show through some fairly doubtful scenarios. This must be a special gift of Graham because she has a similar relationship with Mae Whitman on PARENTHOOD.

What are some of your favorite TV relationships?



Really liked ALL IS LOST. http://crimespreemag.com/film-review-all-is-lost/

Series I Want to Watch Again and Ones I Do Not

As I am watching the final days of DEXTER and BREAKING BAD, I badly want to see BB again from the beginning. I have no desire to rewatch Dexter though. Part of it was that what you saw in the beginning was what you got at the end with DEXTER. There was no evolution of character for me. And each season basically did the same thing. It did it well but sort of statically.

I would rewatch THE WIRE but not THE SOPRANOS. I would rewatch SIX FEET UNDER but not THE GOOD WIFE.

What series that you enjoyed would you watch again? Which one would you not?

Two Shows You Should Be Watching

if you have BBC AMERICA or SUNDANCE.


ORPHAN BLACK has the best performance on TV I have ever seen. If you like a combo of science fiction and crime fiction, this is for you. It is on BBC-America and has been renewed. Watch one actress play six parts and you will be amazed that each one is completely distinct. Sometimes she plays one character pretending to be another.

RECTIFY on SUNDANCE is the story of the release of a man in prison, on death row, for 20 years when DNA evidence makes the case against him murky. This is a slow and contemplative look at what happens to someone after 20 years alone. It examines southern culture, religion, philosophy. Terrific stuff.

"The love between Tony and Carmela was one of the greatest I’ve ever known"

Edie Falco, the great actress who played Carmella Soprano, gave this quote  to VANITY FAIR after hearing of James Gandolfini's death: "The love between Tony and Carmela was one of the greatest I’ve ever known"

Of course, we say things at a time like this without really thinking about it. But I would have to say that what Tony and Carmella shared did not strike me as great love. He cheated throughout the series; he was unable to share almost any part of his life with her, they were separated numerous times. In fact, I saw very little love between them.What I did see was two people who shared a house, two children, and grievances that would crush any marriage.

If you had to name a fictional couple who shared a great love, who would it be?

Friday Night Lights' Coach and Tami Taylor's is the single best marriage I have ever seen portrayed on TV.

James Gandolfini: Best Dramatic Role Ever?

It is difficult to think of a more iconic figure on television than Tony Soprano. Never has an actor so dominated seven years worth a of top-quality TV.

Now in the movies, you might say James Bond. But he was played by many actors. I say James Bond and you might think of Sean Connery but I might picture Daniel Craig.

But say Tony Soprano and everyone knows who you mean. What a loss!

Who comes close to creating this memorable a character?

The Best TV Pilots

This is my choice. It took off like a rocket. What else? (Sorry this was scheduled before the death of Gandolfini).

LONGMIRE

I do not understand why these episodes need to be 40 minutes. Why not  75 as the British so often do with their crime series.  I like everything about this series but that issue. The stories feel rushed, underdeveloped. A show like MAD MEN is written to conform to that time period, but this tries to cram entire novels into forty minutes and does them no justice. Why can't we spend more time on the crime, their lives, the backstory, the setting. A grave injustice is being done here. What might be a brilliant evocation of an area and people we have seen little is now just another generic crime story. 

What do you think? 

What is Your Favorite Funny Scene from a TV Show?

Ditching TV Shows

I had my doubts about GAME OF THRONES from the beginning. But midway through SEASON ONE, I was won over. Season Two was pretty good too. But now,  midway through 3, I have lost all enthusiasm for the show and will finish this season but no more.

The reason is this: there are so many storylines, so many characters, so much darkness, that I can barely tell the characters apart nor keep track of their quests. Each episode gives at most a few minutes to each of these-not enough for me to care about any of them. If you total up the screentime of Peter Dinkage, the breakout star of the show, it must be less than ten minutes through ten episodes. Some characters are on the screen so seldom, I have no idea who they are anymore. And sadly, I care very little about any of them. Not because they are too evil to care about, but because they are too underdeveloped to care about. At the end of the episode, when the writers/directors discuss a scene, I say "huh?" Is that what you thought I should get from that?

What show did you leave midway through and why?

Why Didn't We Learn From Sitcoms of the Past?

There was this brief moment in time when a few brave sitcoms were able to come up with plots that did not involve teaching its viewers a lesson. I am thinking of SEINFELD, FRIENDS, FRASER, THE OFFICE (early on) and a few others. The writing can be good, clever, funny without a huge lesson being learned and summed up countless times. Now that idea is gone and every sitcom is full of lessons. MODERN FAMILY has a lesson for every character in every episode. I watched THE NEIGHBORS the other night because a critic told me it had really improved, but it was just one big lesson set to music. Ugh. THE NEW NORMAL and THE MIDDLE are chock full of life advice too. PARKS AND RECREATION is one big morality play. So I really don't watch sitcoms anymore. Some of them are funny, but I don't need TV to teach me how to be good. To me, it is lazy writing.

What do you think? Any comedies out there that avoid this trap?

In Anticipation of MAD MEN's Return

(From I LOVE CHARTS!)

You probably can't read this but it was used at a panel I attended on the TV shows MAD MEN and BREAKING BAD. I found the paper on BREAKING BAD to be more interesting although it was probably more simple. The papers on MAD MEN tended to used data to prove certain issues whereas with BB they just talked about how Walt had destroyed the very thing he set out to save--his family.

Any predictions about the finale in July? 

FIREFLY

Well, thanks to my friend, Anthony, we were able to watch FIREFLY and these are my thoughts on the series.

Of course, ten years on I am sure they are very different than they would have been at the time. These ten years have provided us with some of the best TV there has ever been: THE WIRE, DEADWOOD, THE SOPRANOS, MAD MEN, BREAKING BAD, JUSTIFIED, THE GOOD WIFE to name but a few. Of course, these are almost all cable shows and that allows them more freedom, more time, and more money to produce fewer episodes. The best comparison might be to Whedon's earlier series, BUFFY, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER. And I think it has many commonalities with that although I only saw the first two seasons. Also I have found seeing a show daily rather than weekly diminishes it for me. Anticipation heightens enjoyment.

The strengths in the show are big:  the cast, the humor, the concept of a western and a space opera yoked together, the inventiveness of the language, the heart Whedon imbues his characters with, and the initial concept of each show. There is always an interesting idea presented early on. Perhaps too often that idea is not developed fully and the show ends with the typical fist fights, space fights--a flaw we also found in Buffy. Our heroes often save the day through fairly conventional means and not always very convincingly. The characters are rarely clever if that is an important trait.

A few episodes particularly stand out and my favorite was"Jaynestown," which was fun and brilliantly conceived. The strongest episodes were ones with a comic intentions for us. "Our Mrs. Reynolds" was also a winner, the great Christina Hendricks made it so.

I found the character of River tedious. Shepherd was similarly underdeveloped. Would either have been less so after time? I don't know. Although I liked the unpredictability of Jayne I found it hard to believe he would have been kept onboard after his betrayal in Ariel.

All in all, we enjoyed this series and I would have liked to follow it another year or two. Too bad.

TV Comedians Before 1970

I was surprised at the number of people who said they did not enjoy comedies last week. I am always grateful for a laugh-for a Charles Willeford book or a movie like Shaun of the Dead.

Of late, there are lots of comedians I find funny. Louis C.K stands out. But there are many funny comedies on TV in the last two decades. The humor is verbal, quick, incisive. THE BIG BANG THEORY is a sure thing for me. So too was THE OFFICE in its day.SEINFELD never failed until the last years.

But if I look back to my childhood, it's very different. Which early comics did you find funny? For me, not very many. I never laughed at Jackie Gleeson, Jack Benny or Milton Berle. I think I would have probably enjoyed Mike Nichols and Elaine May but they were before my time. Also never a fan of the Carol Burnett show or Lucille Ball. Monty Python was only sporadically funny although I love Fawlty Towers. Bill Cosby's albums were funny as were Bob Newhart's.

Who made you laugh from that earlier era?Who makes you laugh now? 

When Minor Characters Threaten To Sabotage a Show.

At first, Kalinda seemed like a great character on a great show. But over four years, her past, (referred to often) was still too murky and I began to lose interest. Strutting around only goes so far. And this year, with the addition of a sadistic husband, I dread seeing those black boots walk down the hall on THE GOOD WIFE. IN a TV show that manages to be lucid about other issues, why this enigma,

The supporting character problem is a potent one. If you don't develop them somewhat, there is not enough interaction on a TV show-or you lose all interest in them. JUSTIFIED has not done very well by Winona for instance. If you blinked last season you missed her. Marie got very little airtime on BREAKING BAD this year. And Betty Draper has pretty much signed off. (And what do these characters have in common?).

But not all supporting characters are equal. Large casts can't give equal time to all of its players. THE CLOSER never developed its supporting characters beyond the squad room and that was okay. (I do wish they had never introduced her parents however).

Now Kalinda's storyline is both underdeveloped and referred to too often. I have read several articles about this recently so I know my frustration with it is shared.

What supporting players should have been developed more on a TV show you like? Which ones less? Who is the best supporting character in TV history? If you watch THE GOOD WIFE, should they pull the plug on Kalinda's back story or do you still care?

What is your favorite TV Science Fiction Series?

And let's give a lot of latitude here. I am going with STAR TREK, THE NEXT GENERATION although there are many close competitors (The X Files, Battleshop Galactica). I love TNG combination of adventure, character, great plots and heart. How about you?

Thanks to the Family Dramas

As much as I might list my favorite TV as being shows like BREAKING BAD, DEXTER, JUSTIFIED, HOMICIDE, MAD MEN, THE WIRE, GAME OF THRONES, HOMELAND, there is also a spot in my heart for a long list of family dramas that have allowed me to have a lump in my throat instead of a gut-wrenching feeling in my stomach from time to time.

So thanks to THE WALTONS, FAMILY, THIRTY-SOMETHING, ONCE AND AGAIN, THE WONDER YEARS, NORTHERN EXPOSURE, PARENTHOOD, SIX FEET UNDER and countless others. Sometimes you just need to be touched no matter how superficially.

These are never Phil's favorite TV, but political commentary isn't mine.

Big Bang Theory

I truly love BIG BANG THEORY but one thing about it annoys me. Why does each character have such a rigid wardrobe? Why must Sheldon always wear a tee shirt; why must Leonard always wear a hoodie; why must Howard always wear matching shirt and pants in bright colors and patterns, why does Rog always wear nerdy sweaters. Penny gets a little more leeway but she flashes boobs a lot. Amy dresses like a sixties school girl most of the time too.

What bothers you about a show you otherwise like?

Forgotten TV: Battle of the Network Stars

The first Battle was broadcast on ABC in November 1976. The program proved popular and continued for an additional eight and a half years, with subsequent episodes airing approximately every six months until May 1985. One final competition aired in December 1988. NBC tried to revive the competition in 2003, but with an intra-network contest consisting of personalities from the NBC family of networks. (from Wikipedia)

Sports broadcaster Howard Cosell hosted or co-hosted almost all of the specials, and commented on the action with a semi-serious version of the style for which he was famous. Each network forked over several stars to compete in a variety of events.

This program followed a series called SUPERSTARS, which ABC used to fill in on Sundays after football season ended. This series featured athletes in a more serious competition.

The reason I watched both series was because it was a show I could share with my son who loved such competitions. Certainly not a highlight of television, but a precursor perhaps to reality TV and maybe no more authentic.

TODD MASON HAS MORE LINKS HERE,

Wallander-Swedish Version

We have just finished the first three episodes of the Swedish version of Wallander. I can't remember seeing many stronger series on US or British TV.

The casting is magnificent. The three leads--the actors who play Wallander, Linda Wallander and her love interest--are outstanding.

The TV writers and Mankell seem to have a real grasp of how to integrate the personal lives of the Wallanders with the case they are working on. The police never seem to just follow their nose around until they discover the culprit. (I do get tired of police interviewing suspects for 90 minutes). And all of these episodes draw on Swedish life/history in the crimes committed.

If you have only seen the British version of Wallander, this seems superior to me. You do have to read subtitles, but you quickly forget you're reading it.

What is your favorite imported series of crime fiction? This may come right after Morse for me.