You knew that when South Park returned it would work in one of the many celebrity deaths that happened over the past several months. But last night's episode actually had, well, all of them: Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, David Carradine, and all the others. Ike started to see their ghosts and was sent to a psychiatrist for it. Here's the full episode. Chipotlaway is disgusting but hysterical.
With all the Michael Jackson news, let's not forget that another huge star, Farrah Fawcett, also passed away yesterday. All of the obits I've seen of Farrah pretty much start her professional biography with her breakout role in Charlie's Angels. But Farrah was almost 30 when she landed the role as Jill Munroe. A quick look at her IMDb profile shows that Farrah had a number of guest-starring roles well before Aaron Spelling made her a megastar.
Farrah also starred in a ton of commercials in the early '70s, including this famous spot with Joe Namath. Here, the Jets QB is advertising Noxema shaving cream, and Farrah lustily covers his face in the stuff.
With all the press coverage given to Michael Jackson, you'd think a special about his life would trample the ratings of all the other networks. Apparently, that isn't the case as an ABC special about the life of Farrah Fawcett won in the ratings against a similar Michael Jackson retrospective on CBS.
I think it likely helped that Barbara Walters hosted the ABC special (which was a 20/20 special and therefore had more name value than a generic special), whereas the special on Jacko was simply a CBS documentary. I'm still amazed at the rapid turnaround time that the networks can produce specials like these. They have turned it into an art.
It is debatable over who was the bigger name, although both were icons on their time. Jackson seems to be getting more coverage because his death was more of a surprise than Farrah's. Either way, Thursday was a hell of a day.
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.
Wow. Busy day in celebrity deaths. First we hear that Farrah Fawcett finally lost her battle to cancer, then suddenly we hear that, after being rushed to a LA hospital in cardiac arrest, Michael Jackson also died. He was only 50, and he was about to embark on a comeback concert stint in London that he hoped would revive his career.
ABC News was already scrambling to move up the Farrah special they had planned to air on 20/20 this coming Friday. That special, where Barbara Walters interviews Ryan O'Neal, will be shown tonight at 10 PM ET. They also just announced that they will be airing an MJ retrospective at 9 PM ET.
Other networks are following suit with their own specials, according to THR.com.
It's interesting how most news outlets aside from Fox didn't confirm MJ's death even though our friends at TMZ had the news first. I guess it wasn't legitimate enough for them. Either way, it's a shockingly sad day in the entertainment biz, no matter what you may have thought of Farrah or Jackson.
This month we're taking a look at celebrities who did TV commercials.
Whenever you get into any profession, you have to start at the bottom. The TV business is no exception. The stars you see in prime time today probably cut their teeth working in TV commercials. Heck, some of them still do TV commercials even after they become big stars (but it's often overseas...shhhhhhhh).
After the jump, a sampling of TV commercials from years ago that star celebrities who are now household names. If you're old enough to remember these commercials, you'll probably say to yourself, "Oh yeah, I remember this ad, but I didn't realize that he was in it!"
I think we can all agree that the infamous Andy Kaufman/Jerry Lawler incident on the old Late Night with David Letterman show (where Kaufman and Lawler got into an argument and then a punch was thrown) was staged. But when it comes to another infamous incident from the show, where Crispin Glover demonstrated his kicking technique next to Letterman's head? I think that was weird and real.
The Glover interview is on Cracked's Letterman's most hilariously awkward moments list. Most of them are actually from his current CBS show. Only two of them (Glover and cartoonist Harvey Pekar) are from the old NBC show. Other awkward interviews listed (with videos) include Madonna, John McCain, and Michael Richards (with special awkward cohort, Jerry Seinfeld!).
It's tough being Tori Spelling. She's spent better than a decade living under the spotlight and having every mistake magnified. Granted, she brought a lot of it on herself, but I think she has probably taken more than her fair share. It's just so easy. But given all that, I think she gains a lot of points for being able to make fun of herself, because when you get right down to it, that's what so noTORIous is all about. Laughing at the absurdity that is her life.
I think that those years of bad press and bad jokes may have been the biggest problem that this show had. One that it faced before they ever shot a scene, and one that they were never really able to overcome. A lot of people simply dismissed the show for no other reason than it was starring Tori Spelling as herself. And that's too bad, because I'm here to tell you that they made a pretty funny sit-com.
Not sure how this story didn't catch my attention sooner: yesterday, representatives of Farrah Fawcett announced that the former Charlie's Angels star has been diagnosed with colorectal cancer. Fawcett is currently undergoing radiation treatments in preparation for surgery and chemotherapy. According to Extra, she is apparently trying to keep a normal routine, as the show documents the fact that she worked out with longtime boyfriend Ryan O'Neal on Monday. But I'm sure she's freaking out a little about what she's about to face. I sure would be.
The article goes on to point out that Fawcett was the spokesperson for the American Cancer Society in the 1980s. Her older sister died of lung cancer eight years ago.
VH1
picked up a comedy series starring Tori Spelling as a fictionalized version of herself. Previously, NBC passed on the
show. It's the most expensive project VH1 has taken on but network execs say "it was a risk we were happy to
take." Tori created the show because she got tired of going on auditions for parts that were all very similar to
her character, Donna, on 90210, or similar to her real-life story of riches. So, she decided to embrace her real life
and even poke fun at it a little. In the pilot of her new show, called So NoTORIous, Spelling moves out of her
family mansion and into a condo, which happens to be next door to Farrah Fawcett. Yes, the real Farrah appears in the
pilot. And so does Loni Anderson, who plays her mother. So NoTORIous premieres on VH1 on April 2.
You knew that when South Park returned it would work in one of the many celebrity deaths that happened over the past several months. But last night's episode actually had, well, all of them: Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, David Carradine, and all the others. Ike started to see their ghosts and was sent to a psychiatrist for it. Here's the full episode. Chipotlaway is disgusting but hysterical.
This month we're taking a look at celebrities who did TV commercials.
I think we can all agree that the infamous Andy Kaufman/Jerry Lawler incident on the old Late Night with David Letterman show (where Kaufman and Lawler got into an argument and then a punch was thrown) was staged. But when it comes to another infamous incident from the show, where Crispin Glover demonstrated his kicking technique next to Letterman's head? I think that was weird and real.
It's tough being Tori Spelling. She's spent better than a decade living under the spotlight and having every mistake magnified. Granted, she brought a lot of it on herself, but I think she has probably taken more than her fair share. It's just so easy. But given all that, I think she gains a lot of points for being able to make fun of herself, because when you get right down to it, that's what so noTORIous is all about. Laughing at the absurdity that is her life.
Not sure how this story didn't catch my attention sooner: yesterday, representatives of Farrah Fawcett announced that the former Charlie's Angels star has been diagnosed with colorectal cancer. Fawcett is currently undergoing radiation treatments in preparation for surgery and chemotherapy. According to Extra, she is apparently trying to keep a normal routine, as the show documents the fact that she worked out with longtime boyfriend Ryan O'Neal on Monday. But I'm sure she's freaking out a little about what she's about to face. I sure would be.
VH1
picked up a comedy series starring Tori Spelling as a fictionalized version of herself. Previously, NBC passed on the
show. It's the most expensive project VH1 has taken on but network execs say "it was a risk we were happy to
take." Tori created the show because she got tired of going on auditions for parts that were all very similar to
her character, Donna, on 90210, or similar to her real-life story of riches. So, she decided to embrace her real life
and even poke fun at it a little. In the pilot of her new show, called So NoTORIous, Spelling moves out of her
family mansion and into a condo, which happens to be next door to Farrah Fawcett. Yes, the real Farrah appears in the
pilot. And so does Loni Anderson, who plays her mother. So NoTORIous premieres on VH1 on April 2.
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