Hamish Linklater-related stories
Posted Nov 5th 2009 12:50AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S05E06) Little Ritchie is growing up so fast! This week he's going to a school dance ... with the most popular girl in school!? Could Christine's whole world be changing? How can the meanie moms be mean to her if her son is dating the most popular girl in school? How can Christine screw this up? By being herself.
Meanwhile, Richard realizes he can no longer live at New Christine's house -- which is really his house -- so he starts to look for a new place to live, and finds a place where I'd sure as hell want to live. But there's a major problem with it, and he and Matthew have to tackle that before anyone can move in.
All in all, I think
Christine is continuing a solid run of quality episodes. It helps that of the shows on ABC's Wednesday night comedy block, this veteran is up against
Hank. And Louis-Dreyfus and friends are doing a fine job of beating it week after week.
Continue reading Review: The New Adventures of Old Christine - The Curious Case of Britney B
Posted Oct 22nd 2009 3:28AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: OpEd, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S05E05) This could turn out to be the single most important episode of
The New Adventures of Old Christine. Dare I say it was "a very special episode of"
The New Adventures of Old Christine? Oh, who am I kidding, things will never change, but isn't that why we love it.
It was a lot of fun seeing Eric McCormack as Matthew's mentor in therapy, as well as his office-mate. That's an easy way to set him up for a recurring role on the show for awhile. And they gave him a shady past, which is an easy way to write him off the show at a moment's notice.
He was there to give Christine someone new to bounce her craziness off of. I absolutely loved their first scene together. Christine all hopped up on diet pills from the '70s, dressed like
Maude and working as a temporary fill-in as Matthew's secretary. Every week Julia Louis-Dreyfus cracks me up with just how undignified she's willing to look for this role.
Continue reading Review: The New Adventures of Old Christine - Dr. Little Man
Posted Oct 8th 2009 3:27AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S05E03) I don't think it's giving anything away to say that the entire cold open to this episode of
The New Adventures of Old Christine was done in the nude. I kept expecting Daniel Radcliffe to come traipsing through Christine's bathroom door. And for the record, I don't think I'd ever be comfortable enough around any ex to be able to have a normal conversation with both of us completely nude.
I've been a fan of this show since the first episode, and in all honesty, as we're sitting here in the fifth season, I'm surprised every year that it comes back. Not because I don't think it's a good show, but because it never has a huge audience and it seems to fly completely under the radar. And I say that with Julia Louis-Dreyfus having been nominated for her work on
this show.
Continue reading The New Adventures of Old Christine: The Mole
Posted Jul 15th 2009 4:29PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, How I Met Your Mother, The Office, 30 Rock, Awards, Weeds, Emmys, Reality-Free, The Big Bang Theory
When it comes to the Primetime Emmy nominations, there are scads of terrific supporting performances to choose from in the comedy field. The difficulty is narrowing it down to just six actors and six actresses (which is better than last year's five each). Maybe the Emmys should take a page from the Academy Awards and double the number of nominations -- this year's Best Picture will include ten noms. That's not going to happen, but that doesn't mean my wish list discussion can't mention all those worthy comedy performers.
Last year's comedy winners,
Jean Smart for
Samantha Who? and Jeremy Piven for
Entourage, were both multiple winners. In Jean's case, it wasn't all for the same role, but Jeremy has been pulling a John Larroquette/Don Knotts in this category. (Larroquette and Knotts dominated this category; the former winning for
Night Court from 1985-88, while Knotts won five times for
The Andy Griffith Show from 1961-67). My wish list would start by shaking things up.
Continue reading Emmy Wish List: Supporting Categories - Comedy
Posted Feb 16th 2009 11:09AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, American Idol, How I Met Your Mother, Judges, TV Squad Lists, Chuck, Reaper, Reality-Free, The Big Bang Theory, TV Squad Ten
So what's a second banana? Well they're certainly not second best. No, in fact they're often the main reason to tune into a particular show. Not because the show's major plotlines revolve around them, in fact they generally don't, but because they liven up every scene they're in. Virtual show-stealers, a good second banana can turn a generic sitcom or drama into television gold. The ultimate wingman on television, there was no greater second banana than my man Barney Fife, brilliantly played by Don Knotts on
The Andy Griffith Show, and later
Mayberry R.F.D.
When it came time to put together this list, I wondered if I'd be able to find ten viable and qualified bananas on the airwaves today. But I guess I needn't have worried. It looks like Barney was an inspiration (in more ways than one) to the current crop of second bananas. They litter their peels all over the television landscape, leaving us to trip over in laughter time and time again at their antics. But how do they stack up? Who's the biggest fruit in the tree? There's only one way to find out!
Continue reading TV Squad Ten: TV's top second bananas
Posted May 24th 2008 8:03AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Industry, Lost, Reality-Free
Sometimes you can tell the importance of a pilot by who the network chooses to direct it. In the case of the Hamish Linklater script,
The Prince of Motor City, ABC Studios has inked Jack Bender, a Lost helmer, to direct the pilot. To me, that means action and drama, not to mention enthusiasm from the parent company.
Continue reading Lost director Bender assigned to Prince of Motor City
Posted May 13th 2008 8:29PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Cancellations, Pickups and Renewals, Shark, Reality-Free
CBS doesn't announce its new schedule till tomorrow, but the news is spilling out everywhere about what's in and what's out.
The New Adventures of Old Christine has been given a 22-episode commitment for a third season; Shark has been sunk. For fans of the James Woods legal drama -- and I know there are lots of you out there because you've posted here -- my heart goes out to you. It was a good show, but it seems that CBS has four new dramas on deck for next season (that we have heard they're announcing tomorrow), so something had to give. It's likely that the choice came down between
The Unit and
Shark, with
The Unit getting the renewal.
As for Christine, I say "Yeah!" I love Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Hamish Linklater (Matthew, her brother on the show) and would have been really upset if CBS let the show get away. If the network had passed on the sitcom, ABC was reportedly very, very interested in taking it on. They had visions of pairing
Samantha Who? with
Christine for an all-girl sitcom hour. That's not going to happen now because Julia is staying put on CBS.
Whether the show remains on Monday nights, however, is still to be determined. For the past year, it has mostly shared the 9:30 slot with
Rules of Engagement, which has also been renewed. Some reporters are suggesting that CBS could be launching a second sitcom night.
Posted Mar 27th 2008 3:07PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Pickups and Renewals
With the thought of another year of
According to Jim on the air, it's with excitement that I report that new shows may be coming to take its place.
ABC has ordered two pilots:
Prince of Motor City and an untitled David Hemingson dramedy. The former, which purports to have Shakespearean roots, comes from writer Jessica Goldberg and writer/actor Hamish Linklater, better known around here as Matthew on
The New Adventures of Old Christine.
Continue reading ABC orders two more pilots
Posted May 23rd 2006 2:02AM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E13) I adore Julia Louis-Dreyfus. She really turned on the charm in this episode. It had the perfect combination of physical comedy and... facial... comedy. What do I mean by that? Louis-Dreyfus' face is so expressive. I guess that's physical comedy. Anyway, this was definitely my favorite episode of the season. It even had some Matthew and some of the 'meany moms'.
Continue reading Old Christine: A Fair to Remember (Finale)
Posted May 23rd 2006 1:31AM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E12) This episode had a great twist, didn't it? Christine is tired of feeling like an outcast with the rich mommies who don't work. She finally finds a friend who drives a Prius, is divorced, and works for a living... and it turns out her new friend is the maid for one of the 'mean moms' (by the way- that's one high-priced maid if she can afford a Prius).
I really felt humiliated for Christine when she was visiting her maid-friend at the mean mom's house. She was forced to serve drinks and make hummus for the 'mean moms' while her maid-friend had sex with her boss' wife. Yikes! It was a nice, clean ending with Christine having justification for dropping her new friend.
Just an OK episode for me. I did enjoy the jokes about Christine's cheap $60 haircut and her $40 shoes. And, the whole Portugal bashing was laughable.
Posted May 16th 2006 2:32PM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E11) Darnit, CBS! The schedule says
Old Christine starts at 9:31 but the network keeps starting it early, so my TiVo always cuts off the first joke of the episode. Maybe I'll start caring enough to change my TiVo to a manual start at 9:30.
There were two good things about this episode: Matthew (Hamish Linklater) and the box office guy. I missed the first joke from Matthew, but I did dig the game where he had Christine guess what people in the obituaries were asking for 'in leiu of flowers'. I sure hope the writers make more use of Matthew when
Christine returns for season two. And, the guy in the box office did a bang-up job with his scene. He played the sarcasm very well, making Christine think she can get into the Rolling Stones concert at the last minute-- not once but twice. That could've been played over-the-top but he took a more even approach to it.
Continue reading The New Adventures of Old Christine: Exile on Lame Street
Posted May 9th 2006 1:35AM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E10) This week we find out more about what led to Christine and Richard's divorce. All along, Christine has been under the assumption that they both had their issues, but everyone else (including her couples' therapist and Wanda Sykes' character, Barb) thinks Christine is the one who ended it. Christine gets all upset but, in the end, her ex-husband tells her that the marriage was doomed and he didn't have the guts to end it, but she did. So, now we know. Oh, and Richard slept with the marriage counselor after they divorced. Did anyone else think that marriage counselor was actually a man, baby? Yeah!
Continue reading Old Christine: No Fault Divorce
Posted May 2nd 2006 5:47PM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
Well, this episode totally aired out of order. Ritchie
hasn't met old Christine? Hello? Is anybody at the network even
watching this show? Ritchie, Richard and new
Christine all went to a movie together
two episodes back. I think
this was meant to be the second episode of the series.
It felt like the second episode of the series,
anyway. The one-liners were uncomfortably delivered and old Christine was still having issues with new Christine and
her husband dating. I thought we were way past that. And, I actually really felt bad for old Christine in this episode,
with her son being so excited about his sugar-filled "fun" day with new Christine.
Overall, I say
this episode was... eh. I'm not sure why the network held onto this one for May ratings but it wasn't a stellar edition
of this show. I much prefer the
Supertramp episode where
Christine ends up sleeping with Andy Richter, or when she tries to
combat racism at her son's school and it
backfires.
Posted Apr 25th 2006 10:12PM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E08) This week,
Christine decides to stick it to the rich parents by throwing her son Richie a traditional birthday party complete with
balloons, banners, crafts and potato salad. Of course, the kids think the party totally sucks because there weren't any
celebrities like Teri Hatcher or Kelly Clarkson there. Luckily, the kids end up having an impromptu treasure hunt for
all the crap Christine has stuffed away in nooks and crannies around her house and they go home happy (and at least one
of them with Christine's bra).
Continue reading Old Christine: Teach Your Children Well
Posted Apr 11th 2006 9:13AM by Anna Johns
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, CBS, OpEd, The New Adventures of Old Christine
(S01E06) This week Christine
is on a mission to make her son's private school more racially diverse. She doesn't really know anything about civil
rights issues but why should that stop her? So, she sponsored a black family to get into Richie's school.
I
was happy to see that Christine brought her brother Matthew along on her dinner date with her "black family",
as she calls them. Matthew's always good for a laugh, like when he touts Christine's voting record by saying that she
voted more than 200 times in the
American Idol finals last year. Obviously, Christine's token "black
family" was going to turn out to be a nightmare and, sure enough, the dad lands two big, offensive remarks about
homosexuals (the F word). So, she gets a gay couple to offset the "black family's" bigotry. Of course, the
two men say they don't like all the Jews at their child's former school. So, instead of diversity, she has introduced
hate to her son's school.
Continue reading Old Christine: The Other F Word
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