IanMcshane-related stories
Posted Apr 24th 2009 9:04AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Programming, Cancellations, Reality-Free, Kings
Were you hoping to find out if David was able to reconnect with his family or why William Cross' son had a high heeled shoe in his room? Tune in two months from now to find out.
NBC's
Kings has been moved to the middle of June after just four episodes, the last of which was moved from Sunday to Saturday just as
Macaulay Culkin made an intriguing special appearance.
This just spells even more gloom and doom for the show that has suffered from low ratings and a juggled time slot since it hit the air. A two-month hiatus is the television equivalent of the "I just want to be friends" dump.
Continue reading Kings exiled to the summer
Posted Apr 22nd 2009 2:56AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Episode Recaps, Kings
(S01E04) - "What's the point of having power if you don't use it?"
The
inevitable has slowly become
reality. NBC has shuffled
Kings off to a Saturday time slot, affectionately known in TV watcher circles as the "death slot."
Kings has now been left in that barren viewer-less void of TV's unwanted to rot in the hot sun of the shunned. Does anyone else smell bacon burning?
It's a shame really. Last Saturday's episode was able to give the series a good kick in the ass, even after
the last episode felt like an action packed opus setting itself up for a shark jumper.
"Judgment Day" has turned
Kings from a simple game of "Candy Land" where the good make it to the land of sugary goodness and the evil end up stuck in the Chocolate Swamp to a complex mesh of chess where the pieces are allowed to move each other.
Continue reading Kings: Judgment Day
Posted Apr 6th 2009 7:45AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Kings
(S01E04) - Lives are more important than livelihood. A major political leader's daughter has been kidnapped by militant insurgents and only one government insider can save her. Throw in a pair of electric nipple clamps hooked up to a car battery and a ticking clock, and it sounds like you've got an episode of
24.
This, however, was last night's
Kings. Episode four takes a seemingly innocent decision to give Port of Prosperity to rival Gath and almost turns the whole affair into the white hot embers of a growing civil war within Shiloh.
King Silas' decision to give Gath the Port of Prosperity returns to bite him in the ass when its residents don't like their leader's use of eminent domain. So Silas puts our hero David Shepherd back in the spotlight to quell the growing insurgency and test his loyalty.
Continue reading Kings: Insurrection
Posted Mar 30th 2009 3:40AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Episode Recaps, Kings
(S01E03) - "We make amends Silas; the pure, the unblemished for our sins." Last week's episode seemed to have blown
Kings' war wad early and left us with nothing worthwhile to look forward to other than a long nap.
Episode three, however, pumps the series full of B-12, beta blockers and a spoonful of blood thinner and gives it the energy and vigor it needs to be a pleasure machine once again.
"First Night" gets
Kings back to makin' bacon by bringing back old enemies and giving them the ammunition to launch their own attacks. It also creates new ones who have the hate production capabilities of a mutated Darth Vader spliced with Paris Hilton and a dash of Dick Cheney.
Continue reading Kings: First Night
Posted Mar 23rd 2009 1:33PM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Kings
(S01E02) - "You're just one boy. What good can you do here against all that?" Kings is a show about a lot of things: love, money, greed, power, guys in suits that cost more than one year of college tuition. Mostly it's about action and consequences. So if the show's
premiere episode was about war as a consequence, then naturally the next episode should be about its root cause: politics.
We finally get a taste of the aristocracy from the inside in the second episode. All the scheming and conniving that makes the greatest primetime soap operas and dramas like
The Shield and
The West Wing so great to watch. The fun comes from figuring how people like Vic Mackey and President Bartlet are going to get themselves out one bear trap without chewing their own foot off and choking on the marrow.
In
Kings' case, however, the plot seems to have found its way out of one bear trap and inadvertently stepped right into another.
Continue reading Kings: Prosperity
Posted Mar 18th 2009 9:02AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Ratings, Reality-Free, Kings
The response for NBC's
Kings has been a good one. The show has garnered good praise from both the TV critics' shires and their sovereign nation of loyal readers minus
the ones who still work at newspapers since they technically don't have any.
If only critics' words could directly affect the world in which we live simply by committing ink to paper. Just think of the possibilities. Barack Obama would reopen Guantanamo Bay long enough to try Rob Schneider as a war criminal.
Family Guy would have only lasted one episode instead of longer than most fossil remains.
Deadwood would return to the air as a Saturday morning cartoon show called
The $*&#ing Amalgamated Adventures of That Unnecessarily Profane #*$&ing #(#(*sucker Al #*($ing Swearengen.
More importantly,
Kings would have done a hell of a lot better in its time slot.
Continue reading It's not so good to be Kings
Posted Mar 15th 2009 10:34PM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Kings
(S01E01) - "We give up what we want when we want power."The two-part premiere of NBC's new political morality drama
Kings kicks off in ways you would expect.
It's not just a political soap opera. It's a war epic. It's a family drama. It's a historical fantasy, even though such a thing sounds completely improbable. At times, it's even a comedy. All of these genres get their chance to shine in the show's first episode, "Goliath," and not all of them work, but they make for an interesting mix of television conventions.
Continue reading Kings: Goliath (series premiere)
Posted Mar 13th 2009 1:03PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Interviews, Reality-Free, Kings
Dylan Baker is one of those "That Guy" actors, a guy you've probably seen in a million different shows and movies, but can't quite place his name. But his "That Guy-ness" has a twist: he generally plays creeps, scumbags, pedophiles, and otherwise not-so-nice people. It's a lot in life he seems to be perfectly OK with. "I think they're more interesting. They're more fun to play."
In
Kings (which
Danny previewed earlier today), the Biblical-themed soap that premieres on NBC on Sunday, March 15, Baker finds himself in as equally reprehensible role: he plays William Cross, the head of a huge conglomerate that holds the purse strings behind the power of King Silas Benjamin of Gilboa (Ian McShane). The complicating factor is that he's also the brother of Silas' wife, Rose (Susanna Thompson).
I spoke to the 49-year old character actor about the show, how he thinks his character has a little bit of Dick (Cheney) in him, how he can play a child molester (fans of the 1998 movie
Happiness will know what I'm talking about) and how much he loved working on the doomed sitcom
The Pitts.
Continue reading Dylan Baker talks about Kings, playing creeps, and The Pitts - VIDEOS
Posted Mar 13th 2009 9:01AM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Early Looks, Reality-Free, Kings
My television has missed Ian McShane since
Deadwood went buh-bye. His cunning and devious but seemingly moralistic portrayal of Al Swearengen made for a great complex character who could be a villian or an angel, depending on the situation and how evil you are.
He's born to play gruff badasses with gravely voices and icy cold stares that could land a bruise without him lifting a finger. That complex character has returned in McShane's new utopian morality drama
Kings, much more toned down, of course.
After all, this is NBC, network television. They have enough
money troubles without having the FCC breathing down their neck.
Continue reading Kings -- An early look
Posted Mar 5th 2009 2:06PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Industry, OpEd, Video, Interviews, Kings
A few weeks ago, I was invited, along with a number of writers from websites and blogs (including our friends at AOL TV), to screen the two-hour premiere of NBC's new Blblical-themed fantasy soap,
Kings. The show, which premieres on Sunday, March 15, has gotten a lot of hype since the Peacock network introduced it last summer. That hype was mostly due to its star, Ian McShane. Everyone knew that the former
Deadwood star would bring a stern intensity to the show; heck, his
orneriness during the summer TCA session for the show alone made people look forward to his performance.
Alas, the bloggers wouldn't get a chance to question McShane during the post-screening Q&A; they
did get a chance to speak to creator Michael Green and co-stars Susanna Thompson, Allison Miller, Dylan Baker, and Eamonn Walker. Some choice quotes and video of the session are after the jump.
Continue reading Kings stars take questions from the blogosphere - VIDEO
Posted Sep 6th 2008 12:23PM by Annie Wu
Filed under: OpEd, Video, The Daily Show, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
Before we jump right into things, let's take a moment to think about just how amazing these past two weeks of
Daily Show have been. The program has always been pretty solid, but both the Democratic National Convention and the Republican National Convention have provided beautiful fodder for both Jon and the correspondents, who seem to have finally hit their stride. This particular group of correspondents works best when they're all teamed up, and it really showed during convention coverage. From Jason Jones and Samantha Bee sucking face in front of hapless interviewees to Rob Riggle and Wyatt Cenac grillin' up some arugula in an elitist parking lot.
TDS is taking another break next week and, boy, do they deserve it.
Continue reading The Daily Show: September 5, 2008 - VIDEOS
Posted Jul 24th 2008 2:12PM by Keith McDuffee
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Video, Reality-Free, Comic-Con
Finally, after sweating through the line outside to get into the freakin' place, I'm at the first panel for Comic-Com 2008. First up is NBC's
Kings. Joel had
some things to say about the show during last week's TCA coverage, and this was a bit more of the same. The biggest difference this time being that fans of the show and the actors are able to get up and ask questions, rather than a bunch of grumpy reporters (sorry Joel, had to say it).
I'm going to start with some bullet points, then update later on with details.
Continue reading NBC's Kings panel - VIDEO - Comic-Con Report
Posted Mar 30th 2008 6:23PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Pickups and Renewals, Casting
Chances are the NBC censor will not have to worry about Ian McShane's mouth this time around; he won't be playing Frank in
Deadwood. No, the new role he's tackling is a much more majestic kind of guy. What am I talking about?
Ian McShane has been cast as one of the title characters in NBC's new drama Kings.
McShane, who was a memorable, dirty-mouthed proprietor of a seedy saloon on HBO's
Deadwood, will be King Silas on
Kings. The Universal project is said to be set in modern times, although its based on a story from the Old Testament, King David (remember Richard Gere in the movie of the same name?)
Continue reading Ian McShane cast in royal drama for NBC
Posted Apr 20th 2007 8:05AM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Other Drama Shows
You know, it's been so long since I've seen the last episode of Deadwood that I'll have to go back and watch it again to prepare for the two movies that will end the western saga. I think the last scene showed Gerald McRaney on his way out of town, probably heading to Jericho, Kansas.
But there's no rush. According to this story at the Chicago Tribune, not only are the two movies not going to air until 2008 at the earliest, but (according to cast member W. Earl Brown), the stars of the show haven't even signed contracts to appear in the TV flicks. But creator David Milch said a couple of months that he is "committed" to finishing the movies.
Continue reading Deadwood movies won't air until 2008 at the earliest
Posted Sep 19th 2005 2:00PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Talent, Industry, Programming
So, the show is over, the theater is being cleaned, and Tara Reid is just waking up somewhere in Hollywood. Let's do a little post-game, shall we? Use the comments section below to give your impression of the show. Which shows/people were you happy to see win, and which shows/people do you think got ripped off?
For the record, I was happy to see The Daily Show and Lost win, while I think Arrested Development got ripped off in the Comedy category. Every other actress in the running should have gotten the Lead Actress Drama Emmy before Patricia Arquette. And no award for Ian McShane?
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