TVSquad

What do you get when you mix Dustin Diamond, Danny Bonaduce, and Todd Bridges? Well, probably the worst references ever, but beyond that, you get the cast of the new CMT celebrity reality show Hulk Hogan's Celebrity Championship Wrestling.

The three men will join other celebs such as Tiffany, Butterbean (?), Trishelle Canatella (from The Real World - God help us), Nikki Ziering, and Frank Stallone (Sylvester's brother), who will try to out-wrestle each other. Actually, it won't be all wrestling. They will also get points for trash talking and working the audience, just like in real wrestling!

Gary, Gary, Gary. What are we going to do with you? Your television brother, Todd Bridges, has managed to keep himself out of trouble (for now, that is) so why can't you?

Did you really have to get into a heated dispute with your 'female companion' in a parked car in the middle of Provo, Utah? Maybe if you had driven out into one of the more desolate parts of the state passers-by wouldn't have called the authorities. Then, you wouldn't have been charged with disorderly conduct. Now, you'll have to pay a $750 fine and spend up to three months in jail.

Come on, Gary! You're 39-years-old now. Isn't it time to stop acting out? Maybe it's time you moved away from the spotlight, just as former child starts like Brittney, Lindsay, and the Olsen Twins have done. I mean, you barely hear anything about them anymore!

Up to this point, the Behind The Camera series of TV movies has doled out an equal measure of campiness and seriousness for each show it's covered. But most of the shows they've covered don't have the dark history of Diff'rent Strokes. So, for Behind The Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Diff'rent Strokes (NBC, Monday at 8:00 ET), producers Stanley Brooks and Scott Anderson decided to concentrate more on the downfall of each of the show's child stars. But, unfortunately, the movie drifts too often into melodrama and gives a very unbalanced view of what contributed to the fates of Dana Plato, Todd Bridges, and Gary Coleman.

A network conference call is an interesting beast. It's not like a conference call at work, where everyone talks over each other and the meeting moves with a glacial pace. No, network conference calls are orderly, polite affairs, where you get in line to ask a question of the star and/or producer by pressing *1 and giving your name and affiliation, and the questions are nicely asked and at times, border on the obsequios. I guess the theory is that the network's PR people were nice enough to invite you to this, so it's best that you not piss off the people who were gracious enough to make themselves available to you.

I was thinking all this when I was on a call last week promoting the upcoming movie Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Diff'rent Strokes, which airs Monday, 9/4, at 8 PM ET on NBC. The call was attended by Todd Bridges, who was interviewed for the film (as was Gary Coleman, who is pictured with Todd above), and by producer Stan Brooks. Not that the questions being asked were awful; in fact, they yielded a lot of information. But I was surprised that they didn't touch on a couple of topics.

Could there be any sitcom in TV history that's more star-crossed than Diff'rent Strokes? All three of the young stars of that show went through multiple problems after it left the air in 1986: Gary Coleman's parents allegedly stole all the money he earned from the show; Todd Bridges struggled with a drug addiction and had run-ins with the law; and Dana Plato ended up dying from a suicidal drug overdose. So, when NBC decided to give the Behind the Camera movie treatment to the show (remember they did the same thing with Mork & Mindy, Three's Company, and Charlie's Angels), it was inevitable that they'd make the movie a cautionary tale about what the child stars went through.

But here's the interesting part: Even though the movie is subtitled The Unauthorized Story of Diff'rent Strokes, both Coleman and Bridges have decided to participate in the production; they'll be seen in interview segments interspersed with the dramaticized depictions of the show's history. Bobb'e J Thompson, the cute kid from The Tracy Morgan Show, will play Coleman, and Todd Bridges mother will be played by Verda Bridges. Yep, Verda is Todd's sister, folks. Talk about being involved...

I only caught the end of the Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards last night, but I did see it in time to catch Chris Rock win the Wannabe Award (like a Lifetime Acheivement Award). The best part was when his daughter ran up the stairs to be on stage with her dad. When he told the audience to 'say no to steroids', she said "no" into the microphone. What a cutie. He also made a joke about Todd Bridges, which got some adult laughs but flew right over those kids' heads. Other than that, I heard a lot of screaming kids. They sounded like they had fun.

Before I list the winners, I just have to say that it's funny how kids can humble you. We like to stick our noses in the air about 'quality' television shows and actors, but kids just like what they like. Here are some of the winners:

Part 6 of 7? You know what that means... we aren't going to find out who the winner is until Thursday next week.

This episode was really a drag. And when I say "drag", I mean that they really dragged this one out to fill an entire hour without actually announcing the winners. The episode began with a recap of who got voted off when, and then all the skaters returned for encore performances. Todd Bridges is awkward and mechanical on the ice, reminding everybody why he was the first one to be booted off this competition. Kurt Browning is sporting a bald head? In the middle of the show all the teams resurrected previous routines that they skated, an element otherwise known as a time suck.

We're down to three teams: Kristy Swanson and Lloyd Eisler, Jillian Barberie and John Zimmerman, and Bruce Jenner and Tai Babilonia. I think it's pretty obvious who the weak skaters are here, but we'll see what happens on the ice.

Just a quick recap: last week we bid farewell to the not-very-graceful Dave Coulier and Nancy Kerrigan. Before that, Deborah Gibson and Kurt Browning were out, and the first team eliminated was Todd Bridges and Jenni Meno.

Before we begin, I have a couple of notes about the contestants on this show:

Isn't it sad how the announcer refers to Dave Coulier as being from Full House? I guess it could be worse. He could say, "Dave Coulier, allegedly the subject of Alanis Morrisette's very bitter You Oughta Know." I actually think he may be more famous for that.

Anyway... on with the show.

Now that I can finally watch more than one channel at a time, I decided to start watching Skating with Celebrities. Why, you ask? Sick fascination, I guess. It's like Dancing with the Stars with an added element of danger. And facial mutilation.

Here's what you need to know about the show, if you're joining me in adding this show to your viewing schedule: