After the unexpectedly well received first season of Sam Esmail's tech thriller, the buzz couldn't be bigger for the upcoming second, which is premiering sometime this summer on USA. I'm looking forward to it myself, although count me among those who were very surprised at all the awards buzz the show gathered in the last few months, outside of Rami Malek's amazing performance, even. I wouldn't say it's undeserved exactly, but the next season certainly has a lot more to live up to now.
The gloves still won't fit
REVIEW: "The People v. O.J. Simpson"
The gloves still won't fit
True crime is an addictive, compelling genre in all mediums of entertainment, be it books, television or film. We were about due for another wave of interest in the subject, and it turns out all it took it was an extremely entertaining, impeccably acted miniseries that managed to generate actual suspense and dramatic impact from a murder trial that pretty much everyone on the planet knows the outcome of. That's what Ryan Murphy delivered with The People v. OJ Simpson, the first in a planned anthology series of American true crime stories, and even if all the subsequent series and spin-offs manage to duplicate even some of this one's success, this will remain the gold standard, especially when it's given the expected shower of Emmy nominations later this summer.
Everyone knows the story, right? It was twenty years ago that OJ Simpson was arrested and tried for murdering his ex-wife Nicole and her friend Ron Goldman in Brentwood, California. It was a hugely sensationalized media event, the beginning of wall to wall coverage of tabloid style reality TV, and a major cultural phenomenon that had the whole country glued to the television and gossiping over the details. OJ was a former football player and national celebrity, and the murders took place against the backdrop of a Los Angeles boiling over with racial unrest in the wake of the Rodney King beatings. The underlying tensions of the trial sparked an enormous racial divide in the country, as public opinion of OJ's guilt or innocence lined up firmly by race.
In a way, this soap opera saga that went on for nearly two years was tailor made to become a television series. All the dramatic twists and star players are already written in. We had OJ of course, and his "dream team" of egomaniacal defense lawyers, with the showboating Johnnie Cochran at the center, and Robert Shapiro, F. Lee Bailey and Robert Kardashian along for the ride. On the other side we have the prosecutors, led by the no-nonsense (and unfairly ridiculed for it) Marcia Clark and Chris Darden, also unfairly publicly maligned for being an African-American on the "wrong" side of history. There are dramatic subplots, including the sexist shaming of Clark by the tabloids and the press, the infamous Bronco chase that captivated the nation (dramatized here in just the second episode), the jury sequestered away as inherent prisoners for eight months, and even a will they/won't they romance between Clark and Darden.
Sarah Paulsen and Sterling K. Brown as prosecutors Marcia Clark and Chris Darden
It's almost easy in a way. Writers Larry Karaszewski and Scott Alexander based the show mostly on Jeffrey Toobin's book The Run of His Life: The People v. OJ Simpson, and were gifted with the ability to base several episodes on major incidents that took place in the saga and are bound to inspire flashbacks among those who remember watching all this unfold like it was yesterday. I have to admit, I am not one of those people, as even though I was alive, I was a little too young to pick up more than just media images at the time. From what I can gather, the prism through which this show affects viewers may be measured by what they can actually remember of the events themselves.
So I'll confine myself to the series only, which I can say is addictive, inherently watchable and most of all, superbly performed by what will likely go down as the best TV ensemble of the year. The MVP's of this cast are, in order, Courtney B. Vance as Johnnie Cochran, who gives the famed lawyer all the charisma and ego and rabble-rousing energy he was known for, Sarah Paulsen as Clark, terrific in her rigidity and stubbornness and possibly more sympathetic in the end than the real life figure she was based on, and Sterling K. Brown as Darden, who eerily resembles his softspoken counterpart right down to the pronunciation and mannerisms. The three of them hold your attention for the majority of the series and every meaty scene they have as the leads, but they're surrounded by a supporting cast that gives everyone a chance to shine, including David Schwimmer as Kardashian, the duped friend of Simpson who develops doubts over the course of the trial, Nathan Lane, hilarious as the delightfully and unapologetically wicked F. Lee Bailey, and John Travolta, who really camps it up as the eventually sidelined Robert Shapiro, OJ's original defense attorney. Travolta gives what may be the most divisive performance here, but I got a total kick out of him, as the tone of the show veers between seriousness, sensationalism and campiness that matches the intense public obsession with a murder trial that often overlooked the real victims in favor of the celebrity intrigue and tabloid stories surrounding it.
Courtney B. Vance steals the show as Johnnie Cochran
Despite how entertaining and ultimately satisfying it is, the show is plagued by Ryan Murphy's direction, and he just can't stop himself from constantly zooming the camera in and around the actors and sets like he's on a swaying cruise line. Everything about the story was dramatic enough, did we really need those extreme close-ups and distracting camera zooms? And I haven't mentioned OJ himself, who was played by Cuba Gooding Jr. in the most unfortunate bit of casting on the series. Everyone else is a dead ringer or close to it for the person they are playing- to make such an epic mistake with the title character is a real shame. Cuba looks and sounds nothing like the 6 foot tall football player everyone remembers. Even someone like me, who remembers no details of the trial itself, remembered him, what he looked and sounded like from his indelible public image all those years. Which isn't to say Cuba gives a bad performance, he's actually very convincing as a mentally unstable, borderline sociopathic, somewhat charming man...he just isn't OJ.
Those missteps aside, anyone will enjoy this miniseries for what it is, and the steps it takes to connect all the societal issues the trial brought to the forefront, is begun with the very first images of the Rodney King news footage. In many ways, we are reminded how little has changed with the continuing problems of racism and police misconduct over the last twenty years, but also of how hollow a "payback" victory this verdict was, as there was never any other suspect charged in the killing of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. As the final shot of the last episode makes clear, it was a hollow victory indeed. For everyone.
Grade: A-
O.J. and the "dream team"
Kyle Chandler and Ben Mendelsohn are Back for 'Bloodline' Season 2
This is actually one of the shows I decided to dump this year, despite giving a semi-decent review to the first season. The problem for me was that it had no staying power. I realized about a month after I finished it that I had completely forgotten everything that happened. That's not a good thing. The last thing I want to do is get sucked into another House of Cards or Agents of SHIELD, shows that I had reservations about from the start, and which never improved on any of them, but for some reason I kept watching too long anyway. So for me it's so long, Bloodline. But for those who are interested in this family psychodrama, here's a look at the upcoming season dropping in May.
Tyrian Faces the Dragons in New 'Game of Thrones' Trailer
So yeah- the dead are coming, Bran's returning, Sansa wants revenge (please let her get it, that rapist guy is the most repulsive and near unwatchable character on the show at this point, much worse than King Joffrey was), and Tyrian is in charge and facing the dragons in Khaleesi's absence. Looks like Cersei's back on top again too, which is kinda surprising. I thought George R.R. Martin would have killed her off by now, but my guess is the show has turned her into that character you love to hate and can't get rid of, at least until the series finale. All the Lannisters will probably survive until then. But it was just officially confirmed finally, that Jon Snow really is dead, for those who were tormented by that for the last ten months. I myself couldn't care that much- he was never one of my favorites and I always kinda hated the stuff going on at the Wall. Also, if Khaleesi is separated from her people this entire season, I call bullshit, given that it took all this time to let her and Tyrian meet and then they only get like three scenes together in total? Yeah, that's a gyp.
RECAP: SNL 4/09 "Russell Crowe"
Wow. And I thought this one might be better than last week's. Russell Crowe hosted a truly dismal episode tonight, and even though I wouldn't blame it entirely on him, let's just say he wasn't one of the more dynamic hosts. Blech.
COLD OPEN: A fairly boring open with Kate's Hillary opining her recent losses and pandering to New Yorkers in her typical Hillary-esque way. The best bit is mocking her being unable to use the metro card on the subway, but there's no good lines here or anything.
MONOLOGUE: Russell comes out and briefly pokes fun at his "hilarious" filmography, but it seriously lasts like two minutes, making it the second week in a row where they clearly had no ideas for the host's monologue.
PREP H: A lame ad for Preparation H, where Beck is a guy who loudly keeps calling Taran out on his problem in public, but it's a pretty bleh delivery of this obvious joke here.
POLITICS NATION: Kenan does his Al Sharpton impression in front of the real Al Sharpton as a guest, who pokes fun at his weight gain, seeing as obviously Sharpton looks nothing like that anymore. Sometimes Kenan's funny with this, but for some reason this one fell flat, although I did like the joke about Trump's -1,048 approval rating among black voters.
HENRY VIII: Russell is a hologram of King Henry VIII at a museum who keeps insulting patrons and harassing women. Doesn't work.
MATCH FINDERS: Dating show where Russell is one of the bachelors as a pervy old man who keeps making gross sexual remarks to Cecily's contestant. Eh. Russell is trying and he's the center of the joke, but the whole thing just isn't taking off.
UPDATE: A bunch of election jokes from Jost and Che, then Kate comes on as the TV viewer Deenie, and her best bit is that she's actually eating all these brussell sprouts in her plastic container. Then Kyle comes out as the failed stand-up comic Bruce Chandling, and god this whole character is so awful that the audience has no idea how to respond to him. I know his schtick is that he's a bad comedian, but when it's actually truly bombing in front of the live audience it's really uncomfortable to watch. I wanted to cover my eyes for this, it was so bad.
SURVIVOR: The reality show spoof where people's relatives are brought on as a surprise, but Russell is brought out as Pete's uncle's friend Terry, to his befuddlement. Russell goes for it again, but there's just no good jokes in any of these premises tonight.
PORGIE'S PEPPERONIS: A taped Beck and Kyle bit where they're overgrown weirdos excited to work at a Chuck E Cheese style kid's place, so much so that they freak out at everything and eventually, literally explode. And once again, I did not laugh once. Now this episode is starting to feel a thousand years long and I'm getting kinda pissed off while watching it.
NINJA: A horrible skit where Leslie is a ninja saving people from mobsters or something. Oh my god, this sucks SO bad now. When will this episode end???
OPRAH WINFREY: A LIFE OF LOVE: One of those random Mike O'Brien videos that pop up every once in a while, where this time he plays Oprah in a biopic but as himself. That's the joke. Is this over yet?
Yes, finally it ends. My god, this episode was terrible. Not a single thing made me even giggle tonight. I feel like I shouldn't give it an F though, because I've actually seen worse (January Jones will always be the gold standard for worst SNL host of all time, for example). Weirdly, Russell Crowe actually participated in just four skits. Four. None of the pre-taped stuff, and not the Al Sharpton one either. Hmm, I wonder if he was hard to work with behind the scenes, despite his seeming to be putting forth effort in the ones he did do. Anyway, I give it a D- and write this one off as worst of the season. Next week it's Julia Louis-Dreyfus, so hopefully she can bring some life back into this show as it ends the April run. See you then.
First Trailer for 'OJ: Made in America' Documentary
This 10 hour documentary on OJ Simpson premiered at Sundance in January, and will now be premiering on ABC in June, and the subsequent parts on ESPN over four nights. For those who can't get enough of the topic and for whom the FX miniseries wasn't enough, you should probably check this one out, since it got phenomenal reviews, and they will be trying to get it eligible for next year's Oscars, despite the fact that it's airing on television first. Sounds like it's definitely worth watching.
RECAP: SNL 4/02 "Peter Dinklage"
Oof. My hopes were high for a decent episode tonight with Peter Dinklage hosting for the first time, but alas, it was not to be. Dinklage did fine, but the skits were abysmal, leading to one of the worst episodes of the season, for sure. SNL often comes back from a break with subpar material for some reason, and this was another example of that.
COLD OPEN: We open with Kate interviewing Cecily as a crazy Trump supporter, trying to defend his offensive comments, this time towards women. It's all kinda meh, except for a couple of cutaways to Darrell's Trump punching a supporter in the face. Not too inspired.
MONOLOGUE: Ha. And speaking of not inspired, Peter Dinklage comes out for a two minute bit where he talks to Bobby dressed up as George R.R. Martin in the audience, and then the whole thing just ends. So, I guess there were zero ideas for the opening this week, huh?
WINNIE THE POOH: Oh boy. Peter is Pooh Bear and Jay is "Denny the Real," who comes in and tries to insult Pooh and his pals, and makes yet another Revenant bear joke. Ugh. This was so awful I'm shocked it was the opening sketch.
NAKED & AFRAID: CELEBRITY EDITION: Peter teams up with Leslie for the reality survival show, and though this should have been funny, Leslie is just is too annoying and her usual screaming self, so it doesn't really do anything for me. Another miss.
SPACE PANTS: A weird one where a couple of muscle men in a lounge try to intimidate Jon and Pete, who owe money, but keep getting distracted by Peter, who shows up onstage wearing a space outfit and singing a bizarre song about his space pants. It's so random that it seems like something that should have been the 11:55 slot, and I can't say it's funny either, although Peter goes for it, and Gwen Stefani even joins in at the end. Weird.
GLORY HOLE: Peter and Aidy are a couple who invite Vanessa and Beck out to join them at a restaurant that serves bread through a glory hole in the wall that they of course, have to eat hands free. It's one joke, and it's a lazy one, but Peter does go for it again, so I give him that. I didn't care about this one either though.
HBO FIRST LOOK: A behind the scenes look at Game of Thrones' upcoming season with the joke being on Bobby the motion capture guy who stands in for the dragons. This isn't funny though, it's just kinda there. They could have come up with a better angle for a GOT joke, although they've actually been doing these since the show first started, so maybe they were just out of ideas?
UPDATE: Jost and Che's newfound amusement with each other's jokes continues, as they seem to think that's the approach that people want to see from them, but it still does absolutely nothing for me. Some knocks on Trump and a defense of Obama as our pres from Che, before Pete comes on to ramble about Hulk Hogan's sex tape settlement from Gawker, and Kenan then arrives as David Ortiz for the opening of baseball season. Kenan is actually kinda funny, and his "Big Papi" is the first thing that's made me laugh all night, so I'm grateful.
DEAD BODY: Peter is a hotel concierge who shows Cecily and Beck the "underwater" honeymoon suite, which has an aquarium view, only for them to freak out as Taran's corpse comes floating into the frame and hitting against the glass. This one is actually is kind of amusing, as Taran works that dead body physicality, so it's the first skit with anything in it that made me chuckle tonight.
VACATION NIGHTMARES: Peter hosts a show that has Cecily and Taran narrating one of those bad re-enactments of the time they were jumped in an alleyway in Denmark, but Kate and Aidy play the bad actors cast in the re-enactment video. It's not too funny, and would have been better if half the joke didn't depend on everyone pointing out how bad Kate and Aidy are in the video.
COMPANY RETREAT: Last one of the night has Taran doing a magic show for company employees and getting under Peter's skin as the boss who can't take a joke. Peter's increasing anger and inability to accept getting smelly underwear jokes made about him kinda sells it actually.
So that's it everybody. Not a good episode, although Peter wasn't a bad host. The material just sucked all around. I have to give this one a D, salvaged only by Peter's attempts and Kenan's Big Papi. Next week it's Russell Crowe, who should be interesting (I can't remember if he's ever hosted before), so see you all then.
Kimmy Schmidt Asks You to 'Kimmy-fy' Your World in New Teaser
Another cute teaser in the lead-up to Season 2, coming April 15th. There's so many shows coming back this month, it looks like I'm going to be overloaded even after dropping the ones I'm no longer into. We got The Americans, Outlander, Kimmy Schmidt, Game of Thrones, Orphan Black, Silicon Valley...it's going to be quite the couch potato spring for me. I can't wait.
Bran is Back in New Promo for 'Game of Thrones' Season 6
Some cool new footage for the new season of GOT coming up on April 24th, although I can't say I'm that excited about Bran coming back. He wasn't on at all last year and frankly, he was not missed. But this is the first time the show is passing what's written in the books, so that might be interesting, although it's hard to say if it will really make a huge difference or not.
Garry Shandling 1949-2016
Some sad news today, as comedian and TV star Garry Shandling died suddenly at the age of 66. His death appears to have been quite sudden indeed, as he was suffering from no known illness and was hospitalized just this morning in an apparent emergency medical situation. Shandling began his long career in television writing for sitcoms Sanford and Son and Welcome Back Kotter, and was a frequent guest host on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show before then starring in his own influential shows It's Garry Shandling's Show and then of course, the groundbreaking The Larry Sanders Show, which ran from 1992-98 on HBO and wracked up 18 Emmy nominations over its run.
