Well munchkins, More behind-the-scenes drama at Seattle Grace! Apparently ABC is having a homophobic attack, they didn't like the lesbian storyline starring Brooke Smith and Sara Ramirez.on Grey's Anatomy.
Brooke Smith has been shown the door at Grey's Anatomy, abruptly ending her character's budding sapphic relationship with Dr. Callie Torres. Smith's last appearance as the steely Dr. Erica Hahn will be this Thursday.
"I'm not written out," a stunned Smith told Entertainment Weekly. "My final scene is just me heading to my car."
It's a surprise move by the formerly gay-friendly ABC, especially after Grey's creator Shonda Rhimes talked up the lesbian relationship to TV writers in July. Online chatter suggests the decision came from the network, not Rhimes, and that other gay-themed storylines have been altered or scrapped from future scripts. Say it with me: Seriously?!
Meantime, Mary McDonnell (Battlestar Galactica) and Melissa George (Alias) walk into that mess this month as a hot-shot cardiac surgeon and an intern, respectively. George's character, who is an old friend of Merideth's, was originally written as a love interest for Callie. Good luck with that!
Shonda Rhimes, who must be weary of doing damage control released the following statement:
"Brooke Smith was obviously not fired for playing a lesbian. Clearly it's not an issue as we have a lesbian character on the show -- Calliope Torres. Sara Ramirez is an incredible comedic and dramatic actress and we wanted to be able to play up her magic. Unfortunately, we did not find that the magic and chemistry with Brooke's character would sustain in the long run. The impact of the Callie/Erica relationship will be felt and played out in a story for Callie. I believe it belittles the relationship to simply replace Erica with 'another lesbian.' If you'll remember, Cristina mourned the loss of Burke for a full season."
I would have believe that, if that new character played by melissa george, that was supose to be bisexual was also change. So let me see, they fired the lesbian, ending the lesbian story line, and then change the bi character to straight, yeah not homophobic at all.
Well, this is too good. The Office is going to have an episode where Steve Carell's character, Michael Scott, and a couple of his underlings make a trip up to Winnipeg, Manitoba -- otherwise known as the Scranton of Canada.
Just the fact that The Office will have a show set in Winnipeg is funny enough. Winnipeg is good for a few laughs all by itself. (The place has also been featured in episodes of The Simpsons.)
The whole thing was actually shot in Los Angeles, apparently. Don't worry, though. The tourism bureau apparently sent down some Old Dutch chips and stuff from The Bay to make it look real.
(Did they send down any Winnipeg Jets jerseys? They still sell those, there, too.)
On the heels of my TV Guide post earlier, I notice we have reached the point of the TV season where new shows are now either starting to be renewed for the full season or yanked off the air completely. So many shows get yanked off the air after three or four airings, and while I know that people talk about how these shows get "new life" online, the fact is they do not. The Internet is generally where TV shows go to DIE.
The Internet is also a good place to rescue long-deceased series from the graveyard. On that note I thought I would go deep into the YouTube vaults to look for old, obscure TV shows that were yanked off the air very early on in their runs.
THE JERRY LEWIS SHOW
Here's a clip I came across of The Jerry Lewis Show on ABC from 1963. This was supposed to be ABC's big attempt to compete with Ed Sullivan and these other variety shows on the other networks, but it crashed and burned and was gone faster than you can blink. Check it out -- it looks exactly like one of Jerry's telethons, which kind of explains why it flopped. (Jerry can't sing, either.)
THE TAMMY GRIMES SHOW
Here's clips herehere and here from one of the most notorious sitcom flops in television history, The Tammy Grimes Show. It was on the air for only 4 weeks in 1966 and was cancelled because, well, it was so awful. Fun fact: the show featured Dick Sargent, who later replaced Dick York as Darrin on Bewitched.
THE UGLIEST GIRL IN TOWN
Here's the open to The Ugliest Girl in Town, which lasted until about mid-season. Here's the pilot episode. I think it's pretty obvious why this was cancelled. You could have called the show The Stupidest Show in Town.
I plan to keep on searching the YouTube vaults for more good stuff.
It's sad that it's come to this. One of the most iconic magazines in America, TV Guide,has been sold for $1. That's right: Macrovision unloaded the mag to OpenGate Capital for one measly dollar. I understand what they really want are the Internet listings.
Still, it's more bad news for one of the most widely distributed magazines in the USA at one point in time. Having seen the current Hollywoodized version of this magazine, which is less about television and more about gossip and hype, I cannot say I am all that surprised.
Truly, this is a sign of the Apocalypse, or at least, a sure sign that the end is near for television. And the end of TV is coming sooner than you think, at least in the United States. As anyone who watches late-night weekend TV knows, you Americans have until February 17, 2009 to get those digital converter boxes so you can still watch TV over the air, as all analog signals are being shut off!! So, yeah -- the end of TV is coming, soon.
The new, ahem, "anthem", coming complete with bagpipes, sounds like something that would introduce a curling broadcast or something. I can't believe the CBC made such a production out of choosing a new theme song. The hosts declared this new theme "the people's choice" and Canada's new "second national anthem."
Wait one minute. Let's get something straight. This song they chose is just another theme song. It's not Canada's "second national anthem", and it isn't even the people's choice. The people's real choice is the hockey anthem these jokers at the CBC already had.
I gotta say it -- the new Hockey Night in Canada theme doesn't hold a candle to the new theme song for the hockey broadcasts on TSN beginning October 15. You know, the one that TSN swiped from CBC after the contract expired. (Idiots!!!)
Speaking of Hockey Night in Canada -- wasn't that broadcast ever littered with political ads tonight? What "air pollution" that was tonight with all those negative ads. Pathetic.
Well, in addition to all the bad news from the stock market comes word this week that all the rumors have finally come true. Holly Madison has broken up with Hugh Hefner, and you know what that means: the end of their silly Girls Next Door hit TV show.
This is really sad news, the breakup of Holly, Bridget and Kendra with Hef. This is like the end of the Beatles.
Don't feel sorry for these three ladies, though. Each one of these girls is going to get a spinoff TV show, and you can bet their fans will follow them. The strange thing about this show they had going was the fact that it had a big female audience, following these three girly-girls on their adventures. These three babes were really getting to live the American dream: living in a mansion and using reality TV to become rich and famous. Just as previous Hef girlfriends like Barbi Benton, Shannon Tweed and Brande Roderick became rich and famous.
The really good news for these three girls is they'll be able to go after any guys they want now -- hopefully closer to their own age. And don't feel too sorry for Hef; apparently he's got some new girlfriends now, a couple of twins. Rumor is they may even keep this Girls Next Door show going with new replacement girlfriends, which quite frankly would be the biggest jump-the-shark move of all time.
It'll be too bad when Holly, Bridget and Kendra leave the show (it just started its latest season on E!), because it really is so-bad-it's-good television. It had a lot of common with another piece of schlock, Baywatch, that just so happened to have a lot of women in it who appeared in Playboy. Like Baywatch, The Girls Next Door is guilty pleasure-schlock entertainment, the perfect way to relax your cranium after a hard week of using your brain on the job. Because you don't need to use your brain to watch it.
