Catching up: this week was the Alma Mater Law School Reunion – umm, yeah, interesting. Chelsea Piers’ The Lighthouse; took a bit of public transportation; would’ve been nice if it hadn’t rained; but the food was pretty much okay; dessert spectacular. I’ll let FC and P put in their own say about it; suffice it to say that we agreed that the little crabcakes and dessert wontons were quite good.
NBC’s “Heroes” season finale tomorrow night. Get ready!
Watched the end of the “Grey’s Anatomy” season finale – give actress Sandra Oh an Emmy; I was amazed by the ambiguity of her character Christina – she loves Burke, no doubt, but does she want to get married; is she just a surgeon; is she really “free” as she proclaimed in tears that were hardly of joy? And, Meredith Grey – Lord, the woman is messed up, and meanwhile is the show setting us up for another Grey? I gritted my teeth and realized why I’ve been losing interest in the show and have scaled back on watching it – it’s no fault of either of the actresses playing Christina or Meredith, but the plots drive me nuts.
ABC presented a review of “Lost” which helped me appreciate the craziness that is “Lost.” I may very well end up watching the season finale next week.
PBS showed the documentary “The Slanted Screen,” on the portrayal of Asian/APA males on the screen. I was watching most of it the other night – interesting takes and I thought it was overall a pretty good documentary with clips of, say, one of George Takei’s roles (I keep forgetting he did stuff other than Star Trek) but I kind of agree with an analysis over why the documentary had to be limited to Asian/APA men? Not to say that the men’s portrayal has been very good on tv/movies, but neither has Asian/APA women. Portrayal of Asian/APA people in general leaves much to be desired.
But, we can be hopeful, when shows like “Lost,” “Heroes,” and “Grey’s Anatomy” have more diverse casts – and actually use these talented actors of color – and more Asians/APA’s in the directing/writing/producing side of things (I heard Nair’s “The Namesake” was doing well; I really have to read the book and watch the movie already). Then again – “Lost” and “Heroes” are using Asian/APA’s actors to play Asians, and not really as APA’s (check out this Newsday article on the topic of Asians/APA’s on tv) – and I’d like to see just a few more APA’s on tv (speaking as an APA). Well, we’ll see.
TV industry rolling out their fall 2007 schedules this past week. Goodbye to the NBC tv show “Raines” – which was pretty good with Jeff Goldblum and a diverse and interesting cast; too bad you didn’t get the ratings numbers and no good time slot.
NBC jumps deeper in the trend to have British actors play Americans (Damian Lewis, the insane Soames Forsythe of British tv’s “The Forsythe Saga”? Well, he has played American before, so I guess I can’t criticize).
CBS renews “How I Met Your Mother” – hooray! NBC renews “Scrubs”! Whoa.
All the networks are seemingly going for more quirky shows. I don’t mind quirky, but sometimes I’d like a little originality. Come on, a vampire private detective? WB already did that – it was called “Angel,” and unless they’re going a different route on this (I guess doing something without Angel’s emotional baggage). Moreover, NBC’s “Chuck” also sounds an awful lot like old UPN’s “Jake 2.0.” Other ideas include: musical tv? (even after just about 15 years, have we not learned from “Cop Rock,” even if this new show has Hugh Jackman and is derived from a British project?); an immortal cop? A bionic woman?
(Okay, NBC, let’s see what you can do with the return of Jaime (not Jamie?) Summers; I actually watched those reunion movies back in the 1980’s and 1990’s where Bionic Woman and Six Million Dollar Man saved the world and finally got together, and I enjoyed them – call me sick; there’s always potential for this kind of idea – but if you’re going to make Ms. Summers like Sydney Bristow, Buffy or Veronica Mars… well, you’re going to have to really work at it to impress me).
I can’t help but be intruiged by FOX’s using Kelsey Grammar and Patricia Heaton to do another take on a sitcom taking place at a tv network news setting. It’s seems just a bit different for a sitcom – and returning two familiar faces who do bear resemblances to local anchornews people. Hmm.
APA’s in the news: Sunday Times: profiling David Chang, rising foodie star.
Time magazine profiling Khaled Hosseini, the writer of “The Kite Runner,” whose new book “A Thousand Splendid Suns” is getting rave reviews.
Daily News’ coverage of City Councilman Eric Goia’s experiment of living on one week’s worth of food stamps was interesting. Goia’s closes it with suggestions on the food stamp issue, including giving recipients ability to buy healthy food. He noted being hungry, yet managing to gain pounds off of the less healthy cheap carbs he bought – which goes toward showing the sad reality of how poor populations develop heart and weight problems.
Mets. v. Yankees subway series – game three tonight. Go Mets!
