Bill Simmons-related stories
Posted Jul 29th 2009 6:32PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Other Reality Shows, Sports, Celebrities, Documentary, TCA Press Tour
It becomes extraordinarily tough to do reports during the cable sessions, mainly because the various networks give you one session after another without much time to breathe. You're also shuttling back and forth between two ballrooms. Finally, if you happen to be lucky enough to get some one-on-one time with a few people (as I did with Joan Rivers and the guys behind the new BBC America show
The InBetweeners)... well, it leads to posts that don't go live until nighttime on the East Coast.
Heck, I haven't even written about last night's AMC cocktail party and the comic stylings of Jon Hamm yet. That'll come when I get a chance. The latest info and quips will always be on our
Twitter feed if you're curious.
For now, though, some highlights of the day:
Continue reading Cable day two: they keep you runnin' - TCA Report
Posted May 27th 2009 3:02PM by Jay Black
Filed under: OpEd, TV 101, Reality-Free
One of the joys of being a blogger is all the comments we receive. Once you weed out the personal threats, the discussions of your stupidity, the prayers to various gods that you get struck by a particularly painful STD, and the calls for you to be fired, you're actually left some solid contributions to the online discussion.
With that in mind, I've decided to turn this week's column over to you guys, a collection of commenters that I think I can say without hyperbole is the greatest collection of commenters in the history of the known universe. I've put together nine questions about TV that I'd love for you to answer. Don't feel like you have to answer them all: choose which ones are most interesting to you and then have at it.
I'm anxious to hear your opinions, so let's get to it...
Continue reading TV 101: Could a woman get as fat as Jason Segel and eight other intriguing questions
Posted Aug 27th 2008 8:23AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Sports, Late Night, Talk Show, Casting, Reality-Free
This is an interesting notion --
ESPN is looking to launch a late night TV show. The sports network has reportedly approached three prominent sports journalists to anchor the show, but not one of them has shown any interest. The names are Dan LeBatard,
Miami Herald columnist and local sports radio host; Colin Cowherd, ESPN national radio voice; and Jason Whitlock,
Kansas City Star sports writer.
While I believe that ESPN has real interest in a late night sports show -- maybe a talk format about sports and entertainment -- I have real questions about the validity of the names floated in this report, especially with regard to Whitlock.
Jason was once a regular fill-in on
Pardon The Interruption. He is very smart and funny and opinionated. Apparently he was too opinionated for some at the Disney-owned network. When he refused to pull his punches in his criticism, he was dropped by ESPN. Are we to think that now ESPN has asked him to not only come back, but possibly host a show for them?
Continue reading Will ESPN enter the late night talk show game?
Posted Feb 18th 2008 12:02PM by Jay Black
Filed under: Other Reality Shows, OpEd, TV 101
Chuck Klosterman, in his very excellent
Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs, wrote an essay about
The Real World: San Francisco. He said that the third season of
The Real World was the moment the series stopped
reflecting youth culture and started
creating youth culture.
I'm not going to argue with Mr. Klosterman. I admire him so much that for a short while, I thought he was my own
Tyler Durden (all the ways I wish I could be -- that's Chuck). If we are, however, to take Klosterman's argument as truth -- that Puck and Pedro realizing the cameras were on them was the TV equivalent of Skynet becoming self-aware and destroying humanity -- we must then look to the second season of the show as the moment when
Miles Dyson started working for Cyberdyne. That is, the seeds for television's unraveling were sown not during the third season of
The Real World, but during the
second. As 2008 is the 15th anniversary of
The Real World: Los Angeles, I thought it might be a good idea to take a look back at how it managed to ruin everything...
Continue reading TV 101: The Day the Music Died (or, how the second season of The Real World ruined everything)
Posted Dec 24th 2007 11:41AM by Jay Black
Filed under: OpEd, Festivus, TV Squad Lists
Like Moe from
The Simpsons, I usually spend Festivus time with my head in an oven and a "no funeral" sign taped to my back. This year, though, is a little different, because a) I just found out my oven is electric and b) TV Squad asked me to compile a list of the things I wanted for Festivus. There's no time for holiday depression when an editorially-mandated list of things-that-will-never-come-to-pass is waiting to be written!
So, off with the noose and on with the list...
Continue reading All Jay wants for Festivus - VIDEO
Posted Dec 20th 2005 6:26PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Premium Cable, Industry, Programming, Web
I have to admit, ESPN.com writer Bill
Simmons is right. The
"N" that comes before programs on HBO is a good thing in general, but they should really be more descriptive.
I mean, what kind of nudity is it? As Simmons says:
"...the N could mean anything - two dudes naked in a
shower, a 53 year-old woman getting embalmed, even Kathy Bates going topless in About Schmidt."
He
wants to replace the N with other letters, depending on the nudity situation. SN for Standard Nudity, SSC for Strong
Sexual Content, UDN for Unexpected, Delightful Nudity...and more.
Andy Richter: The TV Squad Interview
Have any questions for Vik Sahay of Chuck? Ask them here!
Mike Henry and Daryl Hall on a Cleveland Show Thanksgiving
