The late eighties and early-to-mid nineties brought out some of the filthiest, bottom-feeding talk shows our country has ever seen. From Morton Downey Jr. and Sally Jesse Raphael to Jerry Springer and Maury Povich, it was the era when "trash TV" became a symbol of a country's swift spiral down one giant cultural toilet in opposition to people like Larry King and Oprah Winfrey, who effortlessly made interviews with, like, Fran Drescher come off looking like Masterpiece Theater.
Around the latter half of the "boom" came Ricki Lake, the formerly obese star of Hairspray (no, seriously, that was basically her résumé), with a show that combined the usual elements of trashy talk (read: "freaks") with something impossibly dumber yet: catchphrases. Unlike today, when it takes weeks to months for squawk-boxes to latch onto cultural buzzwords like "metrosexual" and "baby daddy," Ricki Lake was trotting out episode "subjects" like "You're not all that!" and "Dump that zero and get yourself a hero!"
If you were on Twitter last week the day Michael Jackson died, you also might have seen the rumors that Jeff Goldblum had fallen on a movie set in New Zealand and died (there was also a rumor that Harrison Ford had died but that wasn't true either). Last night Stephen Colbert broke the news to fans, only to have Goldblum show up himself to dispute the report.
The funniest part is the live news report from New Zealand about Goldblum dying. I'd love to hear the answer as to why they said the police had confirmed it! (Video also here.)
The sad news just keeps on coming: comedian and impressionist Fred Travalena passed away yesterday, losing a battle with cancer at the age of 66. For those of you who have no idea who I'm talking about (and, believe me, those numbers are legion), Travalena was big on the talk show and game show circuit in the '70s, doing impressions of everyone from Robert De Niro to George Burns to Jimmy Carter.
As a nerdly kid who rarely left the house after school, however, Travalena is best known to me as a panelist during the latter years of my favorite game show, Match Game. After the jump is the only MG-related clip I could find with Travalena, where he does an impression of De Niro on the short-lived Match Game Hollywood Squares Hour in the early '80s. (Warning: you need to turn the volume up to hear it).
Every time I hear the name of Jimmy Fallon's "late night show soap opera" 7th Floor West, I think of Central Park West, the short-lived 90s soap from Darren Star that aired on CBS. I really liked that show, even if everyone else didn't. But this soap follows the adventures of Fallon and his staff their NBC studio. Here's the first episode, and you can watch the others (episode 7 debuts on July 13) at the 7th Floor West site.
Fallon is doing some clever regular bits on his show. Except "Lick it for Ten."
I was on Twitter all night last night, and there were actually a lot of Michael Jackson jokes mixed in with the tributes and the breaking news tweets. I was wondering if the late night talk shows would either talk about Jackson passing away or if they'd make a joke about it or both. I especially wondered about Jimmy Kimmel, because he has not only made a ton of jokes about Jackson in the past (as they all did), but he actually had correspondent Jake go out to events like the Jackson trial and act like a nut. Here's Kimmel's monologue from last night.
The weirdest part of that Governor Mark Sanford press conference yesterday wasn't the odd detail he gave or the lies he told his staff about this whole affair/hike, it was the girl in the background behind Sanford who kept smiling broadly. Perhaps the next time a cheating politician has a press conference he should do it with his back against a wall.
Anyway, Stephen Colbert tackled the subject last night. He has a unique take on it because he actually interviewed Sanford back in early 2008 as part of his "Better Know" series (the interview was repeated earlier this year). Here's the whole episode (the Sanford segment is first).
Ray Romano was a guest on last night's Late Show with David Letterman, and he revealed he made a bet with his sons: if they could guess what the tagline for the Worldwide Pants logo at the end of each show would be, he'd give them $10,000. They haven't won yet, but they did supply Letterman will some new taglines for the show.
I posted something about the first installment of Head Swap, the game (actually, the non-existent game) on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon where Fallon takes celebrity heads and puts them on the bodies of other celebrities. Here's another one from last night. I love this.
He's taken a premise that could get kinda lame quickly (like Conan's "If They Mated"), realized that it could get lame quickly, and taken it to a place the audience doesn't expect. Or maybe they just planned this to be like this from the get-go, create something that looks like it's going to be another wacky late-night feature and surprise people. It's not something I want to see every week, but once a month is just right.
USA has a Burn Notice marathon all night (but no new episode).
At 8, ABC has a new Wipeout, followed by new episodes of I Survived a Japanese Game Show and Primetime: Crime.
The late eighties and early-to-mid nineties brought out some of the filthiest, bottom-feeding talk shows our country has ever seen. From Morton Downey Jr. and Sally Jesse Raphael to 
At 8, ABC has a new episode of The Superstars, then new episodes of Better Off Ted and Primetime: Family Secrets.
At 8, ABC has a new, two-hour episode of The Bachelorette, followed by a new Here Come The Newlyweds.
The sad news just keeps on coming: comedian and impressionist 
At 8, ABC has a new Surviving Suburbia, followed by a new episode of The Goode Family.
At 8, ABC has a new Samantha Who?, followed by a new In The Motherhood and a Michael Jackson Tribute.
At 8, ABC has a new Wipeout, followed by a new I Survived A Japanese Game Show and Primetime: Questions for the President: A Prescription for America.
TV Squad previews NBC's new shows (part 1)
TV 101: How ESPN controls the world and what the other networks can learn from it
TV Squad previews CBS's new shows
