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 New Blood Makes Blue Bloods Even Stronger

The CBS drama hit Blue Bloods could become an even bigger hit in 2011-12. The first season was strong, the timeslot (Fridays, 10PM) competition is a couple of tired newsmagazines, and the series has now hired two of broadcasting's top creative guns. Ed Zuckerman is the new Executive Producer and head writer, and Michael Pressman is Co-Exec, in charge of the directing team.

Zuckerman wrote or co-wrote many of Law & Order's best episodes back in the early days before that series succumbed to partisan polemics. That includes the all-time classic, White Rabbit; the two magnificent Larry Miller episodes, Coma and Encore; and one of the more charming homicidal family episodes, Matrimony. Ed is outstanding at integrating comedy into drama, and has a superb sense of structure.

Pressman directed many top performances on CBS over the last couple of decades, including Kathy Baker on Picket Fences, Mandy Patinkin and Hector Elizondo on Chicago Hope, and the early work of current CBS star Simon Baker. Michael is an expert at directing family scenes, a regular component of this series.

Even before these important additions, Blue Bloods was the top new scripted series of the 2010-11 season. If you haven't seen it, buy the DVD to follow the series straight through to the outstanding season finale, The Blue Templar.

If you want to sample one episode, I recommend (#13) Hall of Mirrors, written by Thomas Kelly, directed by Frederick King Keller. The subject is New York City's continuing role as a focal point in the global war on terror. Tom Selleck's performance as Police Commissioner Reagan is outstanding throughout the season, but especially in this episode.

You must also give Selleck credit for using his power on the show wisely, succumbing neither to politically correctness (which plagued The District), nor to the temptation to turn the police commissioner into an action hero.

DVD Recommendation: New Tricks

 

If you like a smart mystery series with humor, consider New Tricks. The series has been around for years on the BBC, racking up big ratings and earning renewals year after year.

The premise is clever. A talented female detective shoots a dog during a bust, ruining her career prospects. She is exiled to the cold case desk, and the only option she is given to staff her department is a team of retired officers. One of these older chaps has more extreme mental deficiencies (and talents) than Monk; another is a sexy rogue with an extended family of ex-wives and bad habits; the third goes to his dead wife's grave to talk about his cases. They are all highly sympathetic and wonderfully played by a superb cast.

These old dogs are still technically civilians, free, in their own minds at least, to skirt traditional police procedures. They say what they want, do what they want, and are supremely effective. Amanda Redman plays the boss, a tough sexy woman who must pretend she can control these guys in order to protect the unit from extinction.

So why haven't you seen this program on U.S. television? Two words: demographic discrimination.

The best place for a show like this is on basic cable. Problem is, while subscriber revenue for basic cable/satellite networks is fixed years in advance by large scale Big Media negotiations, advertising prices rise and fall in an active market. So the quick way to increase margins is by putting on programs which appeal to advertisers. Advertising media buyers, generally young themselves, aren't exactly drawn to shows about old dogs, and the networks program accordingly.

This is a mistake. Baby boomers are numerous, watch plenty of television, and are ideal targets for ads about good cars, good and bad politicians, Florida condos, and everything medical. Older viewers are a large, mostly uncontested audience (except for TV Land and news channels). Besides, this show is smart enough to win viewers of all ages.

The first four series of New Tricks are now available on DVD from Acorn Media (not connected with the discredited A.C.O.R.N. political group). Sometimes these DVD'S also pop up on Amazon, but make sure you are buying it in the U.S. format.

Return of a Classic

Upstairs Downstairs cast Ellie Kendrick, front, Keeley Hawes, left, Adrian Scarborough and Jean Marsh

By any measure, the original Upstairs, Downstairs (1974-77) was one of the outstanding programs in the history of television. PBS Masterpiece Classic recently dared to offer a sequel, all these decades later. The good news is that the new Upstairs Downstairs is worthy of its lineage.

The Upstairs Downstairs cast includes co-creators of the original series, Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins (who also delighted us with their scripts for The House of Eliott in the 1990's.) The beautiful and expressive Keeley Hawes (MI-5, Tipping the Velvet) is a perfect choice as as the lady of the house.

The house is the same -- 165 Eaton Place -- but Lord Bellamy has passed, and yes, Jean Marsh returns in the role of Miss Rose Buck. Her first task is to recruit a new staff for her home of forty years in service.  

The setting has moved forward decades -- it is now 1936 in London. While the first hour is full of humor, there are also portentious signs. The new occupants work in the foreign service, and Wallis Simpson is slithering about.

What, only three episodes? Yes. So savor them, beginning with the first.

Ladies and Gentlemen ...

Hulton Archive/Getty Images

GSN recently aired a wonderful overnight programming treat for everyone with a DVR system like TiVo: reruns of the classic CBS panel show What's My Line? Star pop culture blogger James Lileks calls the reruns "a glimpse of a long-gone world, one that feels far more erudite and civil." In the Wall Street Journal, Robert J. Hughes praised the series in a piece entitled "Oh, the civility!" This is no insignificant cult following.

When the episodes are run in sequence, history moves forward one week per night, from the early 1950's through 1967. It was a time of cultural transformation in America. World War II references, exaggerated formalism, and gender stereotyping gave way to Camelot fashions, references to twisting the night away, and more subtle redefinitions of urban sophistication. This was a time when a publisher, a columnist, a stage actress and a news broadcaster, all well into middle age, were the epitome of the urban "in crowd."

from last summer - Memphis Beat Review

Click here my Pajamas Media review of TNT's new drama Memphis Beat. Jason Lee stars as a Memphis cop.

Foyle's War on DVD

When Foyle's War climaxed with the conclusion of World War II three years ago, it appeared that yet another great television series was gone forever. But three new post-war episodes aired in 2010 on PBS's Masterpiece Mystery.

The first installment is especially strong: "The Russian House" makes it clear that as early as 1945 a new enemy -- Soviet Communism -- was emerging as a ruthless foe. Although the episode is online, the definition isn't great. I recommend catching it on DVD via Netflix, etc. or on a PBS affiliate

If you'd rather catch up on earlier episodes first, here is my earlier review of the Foyle's War DVDs ...

When television's best programs (e.g. Mad Men) go into seasonal hibernation, Netflix is a wonderful choice for those who won't settle for anything less than excellence. One of the great gems of Netflix is the  PBS/ITV classic Foyle's War. Nineteen episodes (about 90 minutes each) are presently available on DVD.

World War II is the backdrop. In the foreground is Michael Kitchen's marvelous, understated portrayal of police Detective Chief Superintendent Christopher Foyle,, a widower and father solving crimes of all kinds in the town of Hastings. The locale has strategic significance and historic resonance -- 1066 and all that -- at a time when the possibility of invasion was on all minds. Not all the crimes relate directly to the war, but all the characters bear its weight. The series is a masterpiece of tone, with no overwrought music, graphical excess, or character histrionics.

Each episode stands alone, so you can pick and choose from this excellent online episode guide and website, or do what we've been doing, watch in sequence and follow unfolding developments in the war, and in the lives of the four regular characters. Produced over several years at a slow pace, the series is meticulously attentive to period detail. Writer Anthony Horowitz read hundreds of books to capture the attitudes, events, crimes, and details of everyday life during the era. Horowitz is young, but he writes with maturity and grace.

As a war story it is no polemic. Issues such as battle fatique, casualties, treatment of prisoners, suspicion due to ethnicity, the religious perspective, conscientious objectors, political agitators, profiteers, and much more come up in this or that episode. Underneath it all is a sense of common cause, and values like duty, compassion, and valor.

Mad Men -- Season Three DVD
 

$17.99 isn't a lot to pay for a full season of the most outstanding program on television, but that's the price I've seen on Amazon for season three of Mad Men, Matthew Weiner's Emmy winning drama set in 1963.

Mad Men is television's most impressive business drama ever. Unlike the megahit Dallas, which depicted the oil industry in broad strokes, Mad Men gets into the details of what makes advertising such a fascinating arena.

What's most fascinating, of course, are the people. Characterization is all important, and surprises abound. "Connie", a stranger, bonds with series lead Don Draper (who won't learn that the stranger is Conrad Hilton until three episodes later) around their humble origins and arrival at their place of meeting, a country club bar. John Moroney's fine article Hollywood Discovers a Real Businessman about how Hilton came alive in season three.

Unlike ad man Don Draper (played by Jon Hamm), the Conrad Hilton we meet in the series has honestly integrated his humble origins into a self-made man's identity. Hilton leans on his Bible (vs. Bertram Cooper's Atlas Shrugged), but is in other ways he's a Randian figure. Draper still has a ways to go. While the brilliant season finale tests Draper's impulse for independence and invigorates his business life, he's no Hilton, yet. Their journey over this season is built on a joint recognition of how the American Dream is available to all willing to make the effort.

That striving is most evident in the series' Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) who in Mad Men's three years has grown from a secretarial school graduate to a recruited star copywriter. To do so she resists both the backward pull of her family cloister in Brooklyn, and the wayward tilt of immature co-workers and Cosmo girls who believe the real winners are latching on to upwardly mobile husbands in the suburbs. Pursuing the career woman path in 1963 was no easy thing, and along Peggy's slow, heroic journey we her developing a trait rarely celebrated on television: patience. There's humor too, as when Peggy, asked to turn off a dog of a focus group from behind the glass, responds "I can't turn it off, it's actually happening." We can't turn it off, either.

And so we were there for the season finale, when Draper made his appreciative pitch for Peggy Olson, and her talents, whose talents were appreciated elsewhere.

"There are people out there who buy things. People like you and me. And something happened. Something terrible. And the way that they saw themselves is gone. And nobody understands that. But you do."

Draper knows first-hand how the Depression crushed shoppers' self-worth. He gets that Peggy feels consumers' psychological need to fine-tune their self-worth, their place in society by using cosmetics, sharing popsicles, or framing a telegram. This isn't just a slick ad man's play to retain a talented underling, it's an affirmation of the underlying social value of what advertisers do on behalf of their clients.

A Public Library for Public Service Television

C-SPAN has put its Video Library online. My detailed guide and critique are available on PajamasMedia.com

No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency on DVD

For several years now HBO tried to recapture the magic of its original programming during the Chris Albrecht years. The network became an innovator again by moving beyond its hip, edgy, industry insider mentality and finding a program with heart, humor, and international appeal.

The program is the The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, based on Alexander McCall Smith's popular novels, and it has now been released on DVD. The series is the first ever shot in Botswana, and it's a lyrical, visually ambitious, and captivating yarn with an immensely likable lead character played by Jill Scott. It's not exactly a globalized Murder She Wrote, but it is a sharp turn away from the cynical, elitist posture we've come to expect recently from HBO.

The stories are remarkably gentle, the visual presentation is stunning, and the African score infuses the series with bounce and optimism. Can't recommend this one strongly enough.

The Closer on TNT and DVD

Jennifer Coolidge, G.W. Bailey, and Kyra Sedgwick in The Closer, "Dial M for Provenza"

The Closer, TNT's outsanding police procedural starring Kyra Sedgwick, goes into its final season in 2011. The outstanding 2008 season four is on DVD with 15 episodes includes two of my favorites, "Dial M for Provenza" and "Tijuana Brass." My full review is up on PajamasMedia.com

Churchill at War

Into the Storm, HBO's follow-up to the Emmy-winning The Gathering Storm, is a timely film, for a work of history. Brendan Gleeson and Janet McTeer play Winston and Clementine Churchill.

"A relentless leader is the greatest weapon of war" states HBO's publicity poster. The film covers Churchill's leadership during World War II, when his rhetoric gave Britons the heart to fight on. His marriage and his future political standing were also at risk. Revered today, Churchill was not without his critics at the time.

Steadfast leadership and the ability to communicate effectively are both required for leadership in time of war. Seventy years from now, how will this decade's American leaders be judged by history?

Click here for my full review at PajamasMedia.com.

CBS' Jesse Stone Movies: A Triumph of Tone

Tom Selleck in CBS' Jesse Stone: Thin Ice

In 2009 Tom Selleck returned to CBS for a fifth Jesse Stone movie, Jesse Stone: Thin Ice. The first four Jesse Stone movies are available on DVD and are in the Netflix collection. If you haven't seen them, you're in for a treat. Based on the Robert Parker novels, Selleck's character is a forlorn, lonesome, highly functioning alcoholic solving crimes in a New England beach village. The tone is ruminative, unrushed, absolutely perfect pacing for a series of pictures about a man who has exited life's fast lane for a country road.

Just as Selleck's (and writer Don Bellisario's) Thomas Magnum matured throughout their classic series, the actor here continues to evolve, bearing the scars of middle age with grace and wisdom. Like his character, Selleck doesn't need the pressure of the high octane action hero any more. Magnum PI was a landmark series, and did its part in history, redeeming the public image of the Viet Nam vet. It also reaped the rewards of a #1 hit, registering record breaking syndication sales for a one-hour drama. Give Jesse Stone a place in the record books, too, as one of the last quality effort in the broadcast network made-for-television movie genre. It's also one of the last broadcast programs unapologetically made for the baby boomer audience now shunned by the big advertisers.

These Jesse Stone pictures are everything broadcast network television today tries so hard not to be. It is dignified, quietly intelligent, and respectful of lessons which can only be learned by maturity. There's no pulsating pop music, no frenetic editing, no one in a constant state of sexual overdrive, no preening urban narcissists shouting into cell phones, no automatic weapons, and no references to "texting" and Facebook. There is a dog.

The Los Angeles Times review identifies its essence perfectly  -- "This is a slow-moving film, especially in comparison with the often hyperkinetic pacing of today's television, but that's one of its greatest strengths."

Flashback: In Praise of Mad Men, Outstanding Drama Series of 2007

Mad Men, a drama series set in a 1960 New York advertising agency, airs Sundays at 10PM on AMC.

What I appreciate most about Mad Men is its maturity. It is civilized, intelligent, and more interested in the human condition than in exploiting facile high stakes plot points.

I love that the series refuses to pander to the presumptions of today's advertising business about the audience, even as it explores the golden age of that industry. More than any show in history it draws you gracefully into its sponsorship, and that unique ad environment is often put to good use.

Mad Men respects the emotional maturity of its audience. It doesn't pound us with a relentless musical score. It doesn't rush us along, so we wait through a long focus group for one insight at the end which will launch a career. It is ruminative, yet it celebrates imaginative energy. Sexuality is everywhere, but it's gentle and understated, reflecting the shame and inhibition which our culture has since lost, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse.

The scene pitching the Kodak account in the Season One finale "The Wheel" has been heralded as one of the finest in the history of television. Small wonder Matthew Weiner was nominated twice in the writing category, once for the pilot, and again for the season finale.

Mad Men is true to the period, and it's thick with contrasts between that time and these, but never as object lessons. Dangers from cigarettes and alcohol to cellophane bags appear in the foreground, then disappear without driving home an immediate lesson like some overwrought David Kelley polemic. One minute you think the ad game is being mercilessly skewered, then the hero casually one-ups a group of critical bohemians.

It's a show you have to talk about when it's over. Did young women sometimes not know they were pregnant? Did a character anticipate those combined effects of booze, oysters and a "broken" elevator, and was that a just punishment for what preceded?

Much about the show has been justly praised: its authenticity, the lovely opening title sequence, the perfect casting. One of the small things I enjoy is that the characters read interesting, provocative authors like Marshall McLuhan and Ayn Rand, and occasionally talk about what they've read. Sometimes they just talk like people who read. On what other program would a secretary be reprimanded with the line "your decolletage is distracting"?

Here's hoping this rich, engaging program inspires other attempts to transcend the conventions of today's low aimed prime time serials. And here's hoping that Emmy recognition will draw in a wider audience to this show. Frasier proved that aiming high to a sophisticated audience doesn't necessarily mean that audience will be small.

Addendum: Since this early review Mad Men has become one of the most honored programs on television in this decade.  Advertising Age magazine went so far as to create a special 1960 Mad Men issue. Here's hoping Matt Weiner's masterpiece will be with us for many years to come ... 1963, '64, '65, '66, etc.

Executive perspective --

WSJ: Would you want to run a movie company today?

Mr. Diller: No. Words like "tent pole" and "merchandising" have nothing to do with telling good stories. The current process of major film companies is so different than it was 10 or 20 years ago, and I find the output that comes from it far less interesting. It's a very hard business to get into, and I don't know why you'd make that choice rather than shoe manufacturing.

Creative perspective --

They say that television and comedy in television is changing," said Frasier Emmy winner David Hyde Pierce in 2004. "And I just want to say when it changes back, call me."

.
Season 1   Season 2    Season 3     Season 4    Season 5   Season 6     Season 7    Season 8    Final (11)    

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TVCriticism.com was founded in September 2005. Managing Editor: Jim Kearney