Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip

[Chris R]

Anyone else up here catch the first episode last night of Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip on CTV? Not on NBC until tonight.

I thought the show was good enough to maybe dial it up a couple more times. Just hoping that they didn't pack everything into the first episode.

http://www.nbc.com/NBC_First_Look/Studio_60_on_The_Sunset_Strip/

There will be several shows running earlier in Canada this TV season including the Ray Liota, Virginia Madsen :love: show Smith which premiers tonight on CTV. CBS has the show on their Tuesday schedule. Could be a tough one as Smith will be up against Law & Order: SVU NBC and Boston Legal ABC.

http://www.cbs.com/primetime/upfront_2006/smith.shtml

[Phlo]

"4 stars" from USA Today this morning. Looking forward to it.

[sadie]

A big fan of Whitford, Perry, and Sorkin. Looking forward to it tonight.

Sadie

[ashlee5]

I watched the pilot episode ... It's been circulating on the net for a few weeks.

It's comparable to the first episode of "The West Wing" in that the pilot is used to introduce the characters and to provide subtle and not-so-subtle hints about plot development over the first season. If the West Wing pilot was a 9, I'd give this one a 7.

Spoiler: A nice touch with the "Network" hommage ... It's so Sorkin. Felicity Huffman appears as herself ... or was it as Dana Whitaker off Sports Night? ;)

I downloaded the pilots for Smith and The Nine as well. Hopefully, I'll get to watch them in a few days.

[Frank G]

Anyone else up here catch the first episode last night of Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip on CTV? Not on NBC until tonight.

I thought the show was good enough to maybe dial it up a couple more times. Just hoping that they didn't pack everything into the first episode.

http://www.nbc.com/NBC_First_Look/Studio_60_on_The_Sunset_Strip/

There will be several shows running earlier in Canada this TV season including the Ray Liota, Virginia Madsen :love: show Smith which premiers tonight on CTV. CBS has the show on their Tuesday schedule. Could be a tough one as Smith will be up against Law & Order: SVU NBC and Boston Legal ABC.

http://www.cbs.com/primetime/upfront_2006/smith.shtml


What we need down here is CBC. Any good programs up there they refuse to import?

Frank G

[93curr]

I'm hoping it gets a little more detailed as the show continues, those were extremely broadly-drawn characters. Good guys with white hats vs. bad guys with black hats doesn't make for compelling television.

Could have done with less Chandler ("Stop talking now? You bet." - please); are we really supposed to believe they're brilliant and funny just because they once wrote a skit called "Crazy Christians"? Would it have killed Sorkin to hire an actual comedy writer to show us an example of their wit?

And I REALLY could have done without the morality speech at the end (man, Sorkin must be a BIG fan of 'Touched By An Angel' and those ABC After-School Specials, huh?). Those things were annoying in 'West Wing', but at least understandable in the venue of the white house. A past-its-prime/over-the-hill comedy sketch show hardly requires this level of preachifying.

I'm hoping the show gets better (i.e. cuts down on the things that annoy me and adds more stuff to make the characters multi-dimensional). It's up against 'Brothers & Sisters', which I was planning to watch up until Marti Noxon quit because the network "re-tooled" the show and turned it into something completely different (i.e. simple-minded and preachy - she wanted to do 'Six Feet Under' and the network turned it into 'Seventh Heaven') and now that that's probably a lost cause, there's two questionable offerings in the same time slot. So I'll probably keep watching, for a while.

But it's not a slam-dunk. And after a lame 'Simpsons', pathetic 'Family Guy' and boring 'American Dad', I'm not really in the mood to watch anything that isn't actually good.

[Jack White]

What we need down here is CBC. Any good programs up there they refuse to import?

Frank G

This is probably going to make a few people angry, but the answer is "no" - other than hockey games the CBC broadcasts very little that is watchable.

[ACK!]

A big fan of Whitford, Perry, and Sorkin. Looking forward to it tonight.

Sadie

Whitford and Perry??? Is this Aerosmith??:D

[Squealy]

And I REALLY could have done without the morality speech at the end (man, Sorkin must be a BIG fan of 'Touched By An Angel' and those ABC After-School Specials, huh?). Those things were annoying in 'West Wing', but at least understandable in the venue of the white house. A past-its-prime/over-the-hill comedy sketch show hardly requires this level of preachifying.
Yeah, I felt Sorkin was taking the business of running a late night comedy show far too seriously. It seems like a subject that should be treated with more, well, humour (maybe Tina Fey's show will succeed at that). I guess being in the TV industry himself he thinks of it as life and death stuff, but to the regular viewer... There is too much of this inside stuff about entertainment these days.

[Jack White]

Yeah, I felt Sorkin was taking the business of running a late night comedy show far too seriously. It seems like a subject that should be treated with more, well, humour (maybe Tina Fey's show will succeed at that). I guess being in the TV industry himself he thinks of it as life and death stuff, but to the regular viewer... There is too much of this inside stuff about entertainment these days.

This show could have been set almost anywhere. It is only superficially about a late night comedy show; it is really about the politics of the situation. In almost all workplaces and businesses, most people's energies are spent in "politics". So Sorkin is probably the ideal person behind this programme and "The West Wing" is probably its ideal predecessor.

[Squealy]

This show could have been set almost anywhere. It is only superficially about a late night comedy show; it is really about the politics of the situation. In almost all workplaces and businesses, most people's energies are spent in "politics".

True, but if he opens the show with a harangue about the banality of television, he must at some level want to explore the milieu the show is set in. I just don't know if I want to watch a preachy, humourless show about comedy.

[Jack White]

True, but if he opens the show with a harangue about the banality of television, he must at some level want to explore the milieu the show is set in. I just don't know if I want to watch a preachy, humourless show about comedy.

No doubt Sorkin wants to explore issues involved with the medium, but I still think that a significant portion if not a majority of the show is 'political'.

And I really did not get the impression that the premiere was "humourless". This show is definitively worth tuning in again.

[Steve D.]

Yeah, I felt Sorkin was taking the business of running a late night comedy show far too seriously. It seems like a subject that should be treated with more, well, humour (maybe Tina Fey's show will succeed at that). I guess being in the TV industry himself he thinks of it as life and death stuff, but to the regular viewer... There is too much of this inside stuff about entertainment these days.

IMO, The best of the late night talk show spoofs was "The Larry Sanders Show." Brilliant writing and character development. Garry Shandlng as the insecure host and Rip Torn as the long suffering producer were outstanding. Consistently funny.

-Steve D.

[Squealy]

IMO, The best of the late night talk show spoofs was "The Larry Sanders Show." Brilliant writing and character development. Garry Shandlng as the insecure host and Rip Torn as the long suffering producer were outstanding. Consistently funny.
Exactly.

[nelamvr6]

Wow, was that show great!

As of right now this is my favorite show, immediately a series recording on my DVR.

Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford were absolutely magic together. And the dialog was smart and funny.

A+++++ :edthumbs:

[Drew]

I think the show has it right. Television is porn. Not even good porn.

[sadie]

I enjoyed the interplay between Perry and Whitford. I'm curious to see how it evolves. Didn't grab me as much as West Wing once did, but I'll tune in again.

Sadie

[Victor/Victrola]

I turned if off at the first commercial break. I was already tired of Steven Weber's bad guy persona, and Amanda Peet's smugness. I enjoyed Judd Hursch's little rant, though.

[Jack White]

IMO, The best of the late night talk show spoofs was "The Larry Sanders Show." Brilliant writing and character development. Garry Shandlng as the insecure host and Rip Torn as the long suffering producer were outstanding. Consistently funny.

-Steve D.

squealy: Exactly.

"Larry Sanders" was an excellent show, but "Studio 60" (which is not a satire like LS) revolves around a late night comedy sketch show (a-la SNL) not a talk show.

[gener8tr]

I liked it, but strangely enough (I'm almost embarrassed to admit) I really didn't fully understand it?

Certainly I get the premise, etc., but there was just so much history, pomp and circumstance compressed into one sixty-minute episode that I was a bit lost... although entertained.

I will continue to watch for the time being, for sure.

[avalanche]

It was well-scripted, flowed nicely, and showed a lot of potential. I'm game.

[RDK]

I think the show has it right. Television is porn. Not even good porn.

elaborate please....

[Jamie Tate]

I thought it was pretty good. Loved the interaction between Whitford and Perry. They even got a jab in about Pat Robertson! :thumbsup:

I hope it doesn't lose its fire.

[apileocole]

Some nifty interaction, well made and has potential. But it's way too generic for me. Set at Sunset Strip to get the word strip in the title if y'knowwhatimean. Good for what it is, and I'm sure lots of folks will enjoy it fine but meh... gonna play music instead ;)

[tim_neely]

This is probably going to make a few people angry, but the answer is "no" - other than hockey games the CBC broadcasts very little that is watchable.
I was going to say The Olympics. CBC at least treats it like a major sporting event rather than a high-priced international "reality TV" show.