Movie Box Review

Another TV year is officially in the books, and the statuettes have been handed out to prove it.  Since the Emmys end at 8PM LA time for the convenience of East Coast eyes, by midnight the main parties are trailing off, and those winners lucky enough to still have jobs for the new season are heading home, while the after-parties continue for industry players with time on their hands.  Some thoughts on the evening:

THE SHOW:  After a lame opening number (except for the Mad Men section), which couldn't help but pale in comparison to Jimmy Fallon's brilliant opening last year, the show stabilized into being OK.  Jane Lynch had a few good lines as host, although it would have been nice to see her make jokes about something other than being gay.  The all-co-star singing group (Cobie Smulders!  Joel McHale!) that introduced each segment wasn't worth the effort, but the Office parody was borderline brilliant, especially the gag with Jesse from Breaking Bad delivering crystal meth to Creed.  Also funny, and mercifully short:  Ricky Gervais poking fun at his own hosting style.   And thinking of parody, "The Canadian Tenors"--that's a real thing?  At first I thought it was a sequel to the Lonely Island bit, but apparently not; having them sing "Hallelujah" amidst dry ice smoke, accompanying the montage of dead people, was like an idea Mel Brooks deleted from The Producers as too over the top.  

DRAMA:  Some genuinely surprising results, and not in a bad way.  Even though it was too late to do the show any good, some recognition for the writing and acting of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS was long overdue (if only Connie Britton had been allowed to join the party--or if at least the orchestra had let Kyle Chandler thank her when he realized he'd left her out, just a milisecond after he stepped away from the microphone).  The only downside to Chandler's win was that with Bryan Cranston back next year, Jon Hamm may have seen his best chance for an Emmy pass by tonight.  Julianna Margullies was an expected but deserving winner for Actress, and two of the happiest moments of the telecast were seeing Peter Dinklage and Margo Martindale pick up statuettes for their spectacular performances in GAME OF THRONES and JUSTIFIED.  Truthfully, Martin Scorsese's direction of the BOARDWALK EMPIRE pilot wasn't even the best-directed episode of that series, let alone in the category, but his star value made him hard to beat.  After all the wins scattered among various shows, there was actually suspense to the announcement of Best Drama Series--and Matt Weiner looked downright relieved to tie the all-time Emmy record with his 4th consecutive award for MAD MEN.  Which really is, when you get down to it, the best damn show on TV.

COMEDY:  Mostly a parade of MODERN FAMILY victors, all of whom were deserving, gracious and charming (best was Steve Levitan's wife, stealing the show from her seat in the audience with her reaction shots to his speech).  Jim Parsons in BIG BANG THEORY was a surprise only because everyone assumed the Academy would feel Steve Carell was owed recognition for his last OFFICE season--but apparently not.  The shocker, of course, was Melissa McCarthy winning Best Actress for MIKE & MOLLY.  Reflected glory off her star turn in the hit movie Bridesmaids?  Support for an actress who doesn't spend more time in spinning classes than acting class?  The best thing about that category was the idea of all the nominees heading for the stage to stand in beauty pageant solidarity for the opening of the envelope (apparently hatched by Amy Poehler and Martha Plimpton), and their seemingly genuine and united delight when McCarthy won. 

MOVIE/MINISERIES:  The single biggest surprise of the evening was Barry Pepper winning Best Actor for his RFK in THE KENNEDYS--he was admittedly the best thing in the show, but given how odious that particular show was, it's not saying much.  (Too bad he wasn't at the ceremony to enjoy the moment in person.)  Apart from that, it continued to be a surprisingly tough night for HBO, which watched Boardwalk Empire get mostly snubbed in Drama, then saw its MILDRED PIERCE get trounced by PBS' wondrous DOWNTON ABBEY, with Mildred winning statues only for Guy Pearce and of course Kate Winslet.  Who, after all these years of winning every possible award, still seems honestly surprised and delighted to get them (she's the Taylor Swift of spectacularly gifted actresses).    

In all, the Academy managed to avoid any embarrassing wins, while providing a few pleasant surprises.  Not at all bad, as these things go.  And tomorrow:  the new season begins!

Mad Men - 1:2

Boardwalk Empire - 11:4

The Good Wife - 5:1

Game of Thrones - 14:1

Friday Night Lights - 16:1

Dexter - 33:1

Mad Men - 1:1

Boardwalk Empire - 7:5

Game of Thrones - 5:1

The Good Wife - 8:1

Friday Night Lights - 11:1

Dexter - 20:1

Mad Men has won 3 years in a row:  can it match The West Wing and Hill Street Blues with 4?  Maybe so, but it's going to be an awfully close race against HBO's Boardwalk Empire  Mad Men's not-so-secret weapon may be its episode The Suitcase, the 2-hander for Jon Hamm and Elisabeth Moss that was one of the best hours the show has ever aired; but this being an industry award, it could be hurt by the extended and very public AMC/Matthew Weiner travails that didn't leave a good taste in anyone's mouth.  Boardwalk could also be hurt by the support for HBO's other nominee Game of Thrones (although that's probably too much of a genre show to win outright).  The Good Wife, a marvelous show in its own right and the only pure network nominee (Friday Night Lights being an NBC/DirecTV share), is a possible dark horse here.  Friday Night, which richly deserves a statuette, is probably getting an "attaboy" pat on the back on its way out the door.  Dexter's season was markedly inferior to its previous one with John Lithgow as the monstrous Big Bad, and is probably out of the running.

Jon Hamm, Mad Men - 4:11

Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire - 23:10

Kyle Chandler, Friday Night Lights - 14:1

Michael C. Hall, Dexter - 14:1

Timothy Olyphant, Justified - 16:1

Hugh Laurie, House - 20:1

ShowbuzzDaily Odds:

Jon Hamm, Mad Men - 8:5

Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire - 3:1

Kyle Chandler, Friday Night Lights - 6:1

Timothy Olyphant, Justified - 12:1

Hugh Laurie, House - 14:1

The most important name here is the one that's absent: because of AMC's scheduling, Bryan Cranston wasn't eligible for Breaking Bad after 3 wins in a row, opening the way for what will probably be a tight race between Hamm (who's never won) and Buscemi.  The knock against Hamm has been that his Don Draper is too self-contained to appeal to Academy voters, who like their Oscar counterparts prefer their performances big; here again, Mad Man's Suitcase episode may make the difference.  If Friday Night Lights has a chance for any surprise win, it's would be Chandler here.  Olyphant was even better on Justified this season than he was the year before, but it's not an award type role.  Laurie will have a better shot next year if this turns out to be the show's last.  Hall will be hurt by Dexter's sub-par year--and by the fact that he plays, you know, a serial killer. 

Bookie Odds:

Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife - 15:20

Elisabeth Moss, Mad Men - 3:2

Kathy Bates, Harry's Law - 6:1

Mireille Enos, The Killing - 12:1

Connie Britton, Friday Night Lights - 16:1

Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order:  Special Victims Unit - 25:1

ShowbuzzDaily Odds:

Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife -1:1

Elisabeth Moss, Mad Men -2:1

Kathy Bates, Harry's Law - 8:1 

Connie Britton, Friday Night Lights - 12:1

Mireille Enos, The Killing - 25:1

The biggest shock of last year's Emmys was Kyra Sedgwick's win over Julianna Margulies; The Good Wife continues to be a superb show, Margulies is a well-respected former winner, and it's likely the Academy will make amends for its oversight.  Moss has the best chance of unseating her, once again because she's got that episode of Mad Men that could almost have been designed as an Emmy showcase.  One can never underestimate the Academy's attraction to performers of a certain age, which puts Bates in the running as a dark horse.  Britton has deserved this award every year Friday Night Lights was on the air, but no one ever said awards were fair.  Enos has little chance of winning for a show whose finale left many viewers angrier than they'd been since the end of Lost, and Hargitay has won already, with no one seeming to think she needs another.

For the most part, actors only get one shot in a given pilot season.  Since the lion's share of network pilots are produced during the same narrow Spring window--allowing them to be picked up and announced at the Upfronts in May--and since actors who play regular characters on a pilot have to give the network exclusivity on their series services for at least several months, once actors are cast in a particular project, that's their only chance for a series until the next pilot season.  (Cable does allow for some off-season possibilities.)  And since, for many actors, the possibility of getting a regular paycheck that can go on for years is a career-transforming event, the fact that a year might be squandered on a show that's going nowhere--with only one fee received for pilot services--is a serious risk.

These thoughts occur while watching Jesse Bradford, Bonnie Somerville, Judith Light and Tom Arnold do their best in the busted pilot OTHER PEOPLE'S KIDS, which was produced for ABC by its home studio.  Did the script by Hunter Covington seem like a good idea at some point?  It's hard to see why--Bradford plays Adam, a young guy (he co-owns a taco truck with a partner played by Malcolm Barrett) who's involved with Michelle, a divorced woman (Somerville) with 2 kids.  (The script makes an issue about their older woman-younger man dynamic, but Somerville is only 5 years older than Bradford, so it's not like her cultural references are FDR and Tommy Dorsey.)   Adam is determined to win the hearts of Michelle's children; her son's main purpose is to serve as a running gag by eating every object put in front of him; her daughter wants nothing to do with Adam.  Since the show has no intention of becoming a black comedy where Adam and Michelle's daughter really loathe each other (which might have been fun), hilarity is supposed to be supplied by Michelle's ex-mother-in-law (Light) and her boyfriend (Arnold), who for no accountable reason prefer Adam to their own son.  (All through the pilot, I thought the twist was going to be that they were really scheming on their son's behalf and pretending to like Adam, but no.)  This pair also does what are supposed to be charmingly eccentric things, like eating Japanese food in kimonos and playing steel drums.

Other People's Kids isn't totally unwatchable--Covington was a junior writer on My Name Is Earl, and the script has some sense of craft--but it's creaky and obvious.  (That actually doesn't make it appreciably worse than some of the new sitcoms ABC is putting on the air, but it's no better than those are, either.)  The only sparks come from the cast:  Bradford and Somerville really are a likable couple, and Arnold plays weird quite well.  (Although the less said about the kids, who seem to have stepped off a reality show, the better.)  For their pains, those talented actors will have to wait till another development season gets going for their next try at TV's brass ring.

The Emmys, of all show-business awards, lend themselves least to surprise.  That's because they're the only group that nominate and award continuing series, meaning that the same high-quality shows repeat year after year.  (There was a stretch where it seemed like Frasier had started winning Best Comedy during the Truman Administration.)  You can't really argue with the group of nominees that result:  this year, all of Big Bang Theory, Glee, Modern Family, Parks & Recreation, The Office and 30 Rock are indisputably deserving nominees for Best Comedy--but there's not a single new show among them (although for Big Bang and Parks & Rec, this is their first time in the category).  However, even at the Emmys, it's possible to unearth a few odd decisions worth noting:

10.  HBO Rules.  Actually, this isn't a surprise--it's been happening now for years--but it still bears repeating:  HBO received 104 nominations today, more than double the closest broadcast network (CBS with 50, followed by NBC with 46, FOX with 42 and ABC with 40).  It's an astonishing level of domination, especially considering that the network only broadcasts about half a dozen hours of original programming per week, compared with up to 22 hours on the broadcast networks.

9.   Game of Thrones.  And yet... how can HBO's Game of Thrones earn 13 nominations and not a single one for Cinematography or Art Direction, when it's the most epic show on television?  (One reason is that its stablemate Boardwalk Empire got 3 of the Cinematography nominations for various episodes.)  Didn't the nominators watch the show?

8.   Modern Family.  In the kind of sweep that hasn't been seen much since those Frasier days, every adult member of the Modern Family cast was nominated for an Emmy:  Ty Burrell, Ed O'Neill., Eric Stonestreet, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Sofia Vergera and Julie Bowen.  Although the show has a fantastic ensemble cast, this had the effect of pushing out people like Nick Offerman of Parks & Recreation and everyone from Community.

7.  Treme.  Not to beat a dead horse about HBO deserving still more nominations, and no one expected the show to break into Best Drama with its anemic ratings, but still:  No cast member?  No writer?  No director?  Quality is supposed to be a factor here, folks.

6.   Network Comedy.  For the first time in quite a while, all the nominees for Best Comedy air on broadcast networks:  the flagship shows from CBS, ABC and FOX (Big Bang, Modern Family and Glee, respectively), and from what remains of NBC's glory, 3 of its Thursday night line-up:  The Office, Parks & Recreation and 30 Rock.  (We'll see next year if a post-Steve Carell Office can stay in the hunt.) 

5.   Miniseries Actors.  Despite their lack of popular success, superb performances by Idris Elba in Luther and Edgar Ramirez in Carlos were both nominated in the Miniseries Actor category (although neither of their shows made it to Best Movie/Miniseries).  Some recognition is better than none.

4.   Conan.  It's not a surprise that Conan O'Brien's TBS show was nominated for Best Variety/Music/Comedy Series and Jay Leno's Tonight Show wasn't.  What is a surprise is that Conan squeezed out perennial nominee David Letterman.

3.   Friday Night Lights.  Now that it's too late to make any difference (the series finale, having already aired on DirecTV, has its NBC run tomorrow), the Academy finally took note of Friday Night Lights, certainly one of the best dramas to air on network television in the past decade.  (Kyle Chandler and Connie Britten were both nominated again for their iconic performances, but no one in the spectacular supporting cast.)  In this case, better late than never doesn't quite cut it.

2.   The Kennedys.  One of the worst shows in the history of television--and I don't care what the viewer's politics are--somehow managed to get 10 nominations, including for Best Movie/Miniseries and all its major actors as well (except Katie Holmes and her waxworks Jackie Kennedy).  I have no explanation for this, but will just note that the Liberal Conspiracy That Controls Hollywood apparently didn't send in their ballots this year.  (Less surprising are the 21 nominations for Mildred Pierce, which was a show hardly anyone seemed to like, but in a very respectful way.)

1.   Louie.  The Academy was never going to nominate Louie C.K.'s brilliant, hilarious, scabrous, endlessly daring, sometimes lyrical, often offensive half-hour for Best Comedy.  (If you haven't seen it--and you should--think Seinfeld meets a John Cassavettes movie meets Taxi Driver.)  But bless those nominators, they gave its auteur nominations for Best Actor and Comedy Script.  So yes, sometimes the Emmys manage the biggest surprise of all:  they do the right thing.