By Edward Kelly
Intimate is not usually a word used when describing late night talk shows. Generally, a better track to take is to simply focus on the host’s ability to crack a few jokes, ensure that they’re relatively amiable, and that they interview a hopefully engaging guest. But if it were that easy then everyone would be able to do it.
On Monday night, Conan O’Brien returned to the airwaves on the cable network TBS. His new show, aptly titled Conan, marks what will hopefully be the denouement of The Late Night Debacle. To refresh: O’Brien took over The Tonight Show in June of 2009. After only seven months at the helm, NBC decided that maintaining a cool head in the face of trying times was a really dumb idea. Instead they seemed to think that panicking, airing private grievances in the most public of forums, and spending Brinks truck’s full of cash would be a much better way of doing business. It was like the National Broadcasting Company decided that nothing says “profits” to shareholders like the execs reenacting plots from Degrassi Junior High. You know what came next: O’Brien was ousted and offered his too-late slot back, and Leno was reinstalled in his old post-news position.
Instead of disappearing quietly back to the graveyard shift, O’Brien did what he does best: went right on being Conan O’Brien. He hit the road with his Legally Prohibited From Being Funny On Television Tour and signed up for a Twitter account. Then came the deal with TBS. Now, with the agreed waiting period required by NBC at an end, the new cable show is up and running.
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by Damon Martin
After a stunning debut that drew in over 5 million viewers last week, AMC’s new series The Walking Dead has been picked up for a second season with a 13 episode run already approved by the network. Indeed, the zombie filled show, based on Robert Kirkman’s comics of the same name, has broken cable records for viewership among adults 18-49.
Now that The Walking Dead can be called a legitimate hit, television networks will likely mine the comic book world vein, looking for more material that can be turned into TV gold. Shows like NBC’s Heroes and ABC’s No Ordinary Family have drawn upon the superhero myth, but weren’t actually based on any established work. So as The Walking Dead continues on AMC, let’s take a look at five series comic book series that have the potential to make it big in TV land.
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By Erin Broadley
There are drummers, and then there are street drummers – the guys who truly aren’t afraid to get down and dirty with their craft. The musicians in Street Drum Corps are both, having played played traditional drums in rock bands for years before lending their sticks to something decidedly more free-form and experimental.
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by Fred Topel
“I’m good at starting things.”
– Terry Gilliam
Terry Gilliam movies are hard to explain anyway. Try to encapsulate 12 Monkeys in a logline about time travel, or pose The Fisher King as as simple drama about grief. The lengths Gilliam had to go through to finish what tragically became Heath Ledger’s final film take things to the next level.
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by Nicole Powers
The Huntington Library is world-renowned for it’s collection of rare books and manuscripts, which include a Gutenberg Bible and a first folio edition of William Shakespeare’s collected plays. Eyes were therefore raised four years ago when the institution acquired something a little racier – a collection of artifacts relating to Henry Charles Bukowski (1920-1994), donated by his widow Linda Lee Bukowski.
Known for his hard-drinking and hell-raising ways, Bukowski gained notoriety and fame chronicling society’s underbelly in his hyper-real, gritty and pithy poems and prose. (The screenplay for the 1987 film Barfly, which starred Mickey Rourke, was written by Bukowski and is semi-autobiographical.) However to see his work though the bottom of a glass is to see it only in one dimension as poems like “Bluebird” and “Laughing Heart” attest.
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by Nicole Powers
“We have fittings and sip violet champagne.”
– Dita Von Teese
Dita Von Teese is one of the world’s most dazzling women. The Swarovski-adorned mistress of striptease has done more to preserve and promote the hallowed art of burlesque than any other performer alive today. Her sexy and spectacular shows feature stunning costumes and larger-than-life props, but are always grounded in the purity of the classic art form. Thus they have an innate dignity that never relies on the kind of bump and grind sleaze that many of Dita’s contemporaries mistake for erotica.
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by Blogbot
Gary Numan played the final show of his US tour last night in front of a packed house at the El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles (it was his second consecutive sold out performance at the venue). Marking the 30th anniversary of his classic Pleasure Principle album – which features the seminal electro tracks “Cars” and “Metal” – Numan played the bulk of the album in the first half his set before exchanging his keyboard for a guitar and launching into newer material.
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