INDUSTRY CONSOLIDATION, career uncertainty, fractious home lives: Season three of Mad Men showed us that even in the putatively placid early 1960s, the American middle class faced many of the same tumultuousness that it does today. Thankfully, the season's uneven first half gave way to a stunning, swiftly paced second half that left the Draper family reeling professionally and personally. Season four will begin this summer with many unanswered questions.
Continue reading "Season 3 of 'Mad Men': Initial Stumbles, Followed By a Stunning Recovery" »
AS IF local punditry hadn't already welcomed enough buffoons and clowns and charlatans to its carnival, through the open flap steps one Larry Mendte, late of CBS's Philadelphia affiliate, who:
- Was involved in a personal relationship with a coworker, which would be fine if he weren't already, y'know, married. To someone else.
- Was fired after hacking into that coworker's personal e-mail account.
- Leaked private info about her to local gossip columnists, essentially keeping the Daily News solvent for a few more years.
- Pleaded guilty to a federal charge to make it all go away.
So of course he would be a perfect candidate to deliver televised commentaries on current affairs. Mendte, it was reported last week, has been taping pieces for New York's WPIX-TV, which will syndicate them throughout the country and which anticipates hiring him full-time soon.
Continue reading "Murrow and Cronkite, Move Over: Mendte and Bonaduce Have Their TelePrompters Ready" »
Yikes--I came back Saturday from a week's vacation and discovered that Remote Control helmsman Ken Ober and Equalizer Edward Woodward had passed on. If one believes that these things tend to happen in threes, then we need to look after our '80s icons lest something else happen. Somebody keep Mr. T away from sharp objects, okay? | PRS
Let's get the obvious point out of the way first: Yes, the half-truths and exaggerations and obfuscations engaged in by the ad-agency folks in AMC's Mad Men are indeed stand-ins for the broken realities of their lives. It is the central conceit of the show. From marital affairs and stolen identities to closeted homosexuality and depression, these amoral characters trade in deception as much personally as they do professionally. How these struggles are rendered makes the show a stunner.
Continue reading "For AMC's 'Mad Men,' the Truth Is Darker and Far More Entertaining Than Their Fictions" »
How thin must the ranks of statewide Democrats be that the party was intensely wooing Chris Matthews to make a run against Arlen Specter in 2010? I realize that as a middle-aged white guy who makes his living talking out of his ass, Matthews would bring certain prized qualifications to a Senate campaign, but still. One wonders whether the Hardball host kept his bosses at NBC and Pennsylvania Democrats hanging for so long in order to get the best deal one way or the other. In the end, Matthews told the Inquirer the other day, "there's a wonderful power in being able to get up in the morning and
do and say what you believe. As long
as I'm decent and don't use bad words, I can do pretty much anything I
want."
Continue reading "Maybe Larry Kane Is Available" »