Cavemen

While watching the 2007 NBA Finals I caught the promos "Cavemen", a sitcom that is set to debut this fall on ABC. As you probably know, this show is based on the characters featured in a series of television ads for Geico Insurance. This has all the makings of being a pretty funny show... or going down as one of the worst ideas in TV history. I have to say that the curiosity factor will get me to tune in at least once.

What are your nominees for some of the worst ideas in TV history?

Tyler Perry's House of Payne

I watched the new TBS sitcom "Tyler Perry's House of Payne" for the 1st time tonight. Since its sister station TNT bombarded us basketball fans with commercials for the sitcom during the 2007 NBA playoffs, I felt compelled to give it a shot. "House of Payne" stars LaVan Davis and Cassi Davis as Curtis and Ella Payne, an older couple who take in his firefighter nephew CJ (Allen Payne), his wife Janine (Demetria McKinney) and their two children after their house burns down.

With a title such as "House of Payne", it would be too easy to use variations of the word "pain" to describe my thoughts on the show. However, I won't go there. I'll just say... it sucks! Badly written/acted, preachy, and with jokes so weak even the laugh track can barely muster a chuckle, "House of Payne" makes "Punky Brewster" look like "The Cosby Show"! When a script has a character spouting lines stolen from Diane Sawyer's 2002 interview with Whitney Houston ("crack is whack", "show me receipts"), you know it's in serious trouble.

TBS reportedly ponied up $200 million dollars for 100 episodes of "House of Payne". I'm being generous when I say that Tyler Perry owes TBS $199,999,999.

Did you happen to catch "House of Payne"? If so, what are your thoughts?

The Sopranos Finale

Although I was not a regular viewer of "The Sopranos", I did get caught up in the hoopla surrounding the series finale. From what I've heard/read from fans of the show, most of them fell into one of two camps... they either thought the final episode was brilliant or they were ready to "whack" series creator David Chase. When you combine the intense media hype with fans' raised expectations, it was next to impossible for "The Sopranos" finale to satisfy most of its fans. It reminds me of the disappointment that many felt towards the final episode of "Seinfeld" (I seemed to be one of the few who liked it). Which series finale did you love (or hate) the most?

Anatomy of A Firing

Late last week, it was announced that Isaiah Washington would not be returning to the hit ABC show "Grey's Anatomy". After months of speculation, the producers of the medical drama elected not to renew Washington's contract for next season. In a statement released by his publicist, Washington made the "Networky" comment "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore" (If "Networky" isn't a word... it is now). One of the ironies of this controversy is that Washington played a gay man in the Spike Lee film "Get On the Bus".

Even if you are like me and don't watch "Grey's Anatomy", you had to have been on a deserted isle somewhere not to have heard what all the fuss is about surrounding the Washington controversy. In case you were living the life of Gilligan for the past several months, a fight involving Washington and one of his co-stars (Patrick Dempsey) took place on the set of the show. During the dustup, Washington used a term for "bundle of sticks" in reference to the sexuality of another co-star (T.R. Knight).

In the weeks that followed, Washington denied using the term and then admitted that he did. In addition to stating that he was seeking therapy, Washington also met with officials from the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network and the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation and filmed a public service announcement in which he said "words have power" to hurt or heal.

The bottom line is that Washington shouldn't have said what he said in regards to Knight's sexuality. He also didn't do himself any favors backstage at the Golden Globes when he denied his original comments while speaking to reporters... but uttered the slur again! However, I'm not sure if his comments are grounds for him getting the ax. After all, it did seem like he made a concerted effort to make things right. Of course it is human nature to question whether or not his actions to make amends were genuine.

This controversy does make me wonder how things would have been handled under different circumstances. I suspect that the producers of "Grey's Anatomy" feel that Washington is expendable and that the show can continue to have success without him. Let's say that everything happened as it did, but instead of Washington using the derogatory slur... it was Patrick Dempsey (aka Dr. McDreamy) or how about Ellen Pompeo (aka Dr. Meredith Grey). Do you think either of them would have been shown the door?

Spin City Playlist For 6/9/07

4 pm hour

When I Think of You- Janet Jackson
Your Love Is A Miracle- AWB
I’m Qualified To Satisfy You- Barry White
Shake It Up- The Cars
Oh L'amour- Erasure
How Long- Lipps Inc.
Harry Hippie- Bobby Womack

Common Thread segment (songs orig. recorded by The Beatles):
You Won’t See Me- Anne Murray
We Can Work It Out- Stevie Wonder
Got To Get You Into My Life- Earth, Wind, and Fire
I Saw Him Standing There- Tiffany

Breaking the Law- Judas Priest
Wild Boys- Duran Duran
Body Heat- James Brown

5 pm hour

Venus- Shocking Blue
There’s No Me Without You- The Manhattans
Too Many Games- Maze feat. Frankie Beverly
Sultans of Swing- Dire Straits
Give Me Just A Little More Time- Chairmen of the Board
Cherish What Is Dear To You- Freda Payne
Wrap Her Up- Elton John

On the Flip Side:
Any Major Dude Will Tell You- Steely Dan (B-side to Rikki Don’t Lose That Number)

You Sexy Thing- Hot Chocolate
17 Days- Prince
Treat Me Right- Pat Benatar
Share the Land- The Guess Who
Full of Fire- Al Green
A Perfect Kiss- New Order

6 pm hour

Love In An Elevator- Aerosmith
Steamy Windows- Tina Turner
Shake- The Gap Band
Timothy- The Buoys
You’re the One That I Want- John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John
She’s Sexy + 17- Stray Cats
Roxanne Roxanne- UTFO
So Fine- Howard Johnson
Edge of Seventeen- Stevie Nicks
Contact- Edwin Starr
Stuck In the Middle With You- Stealers Wheel
I Won’t Let You Down- PhD
Rockit- Herbie Hancock

Spare Us Paris

It is refreshing to see that sometimes justice is served. Friday morning, a crying and disheveled Paris Hilton was hauled into court and learned that she will be going back to the L.A. county jailto serve out the remaining days of her sentence for violating probation in an alcohol-related reckless driving case. After Judge Michael T. Sauer laid down his gavel, Paris was led away by two deputies as she cried for her mommy.

When I started this blog earlier in the year, I tried to avoid writing about "celebs" such as Paris because they hardly seemed worth the space. People who are famous just for being famous normally don't move me. However, I was compelled to throw in my copper-plated Lincolns after this latest episode. For many of us who reside in what is known as the real world, the announcement on Thursday that Paris would be confined to the drab and dusty confines of her mansion because of a "medical condition" was further proof that being rich and famous means that you can do what you want when you want without any consequences. Repeatedly break the law and you get a sentence that basically amounts to being grounded... yeah, that seems fair.

The fact that Judge Michael T. Sauer saw to it that Paris wasn't allowed to skate and spend the remainder of her sentence chillin' at the crib makes me a little (just a little) more faithful in the judicial system. Who knows, maybe her time in jail will force Paris to get her "mind right" (whenever there's a chance for me to work in a Cool Hand Luke reference, I gotta bite). Hell, I am probably kidding myself... right?

The Death of A Local TV Legend

Welcome to the Dead Zone...aka Pop Culture Dish. Sad to say that this is the 3rd post (in as many days) related to the death of a celebrity. Scott, a friend and fellow member of the Oldies Trivia team on which I compete informed me that Lawson Deming had died. You may know Deming better as Sir Graves Ghastly. After looking it up on imdb.com, I found that he died of congestive heart failure on April 27th at the age of 94.

If you grew up in the Metro Detroit/Ohio area during the period between the late 60s and early 80s, chances are that you spent many Saturday afternoons checking out Sir Graves Ghastly on WJBK-Channel 2. Right after Don Cornelius wished us "love, peace, and soul", Sir Graves would assault the airwaves with corny comedy (of which I am a huge fan) and some of the spookiest movies from yesteryear. I have fond memories of seeing such classics as the 1931 version of "Frankenstein", Lon Chaney Jr. in "The Wolf Man", and "The Werewolf of London" on Sir Graves Ghastly. If it was a bad weather day or during the winter when it gets dark early, that made the movie viewing experience all the better.

Although my mother couldn't stand Sir Graves (she had a low tolerance for silliness), I thought he was great! Sad to say that with the cable boom, Sir Graves and many other local TV hosts fell by the wayside. Kids today have no idea what they missed.

If you want to relive some of your childhood memories or if you want to get an idea of what you missed, check out this cool site that I found:

http://www.sirgravesghastly.com/index.htm

Happy Haunting, nyahhhh!!

Tony Thompson, R.I.P.

Just hours after my post on the late Charles Nelson Reilly, I learned about the death of another celebrity...Tony Thompson. Not to be confused with the late drummer for Chic and the Power Station who shares his name, you may remember Tony for his work as the lead singer of the teen group from the early 90s, Hi-Five. Their biggest single was the #1 R&B/#1 pop hit "I Like the Way (The Kissing Game)". Thompson died of an apparent drug overdose at the age of 31. In addition to the hits he scored with Hi-Five, Tony Thompson also hit the charts a couple of times in the mid 90s as a solo artist.

Although it had been awhile since Thompson had a hit on the charts, he was still active in the music biz. As a matter of fact, he was working on a new album that was scheduled to be released in the fall. I visited his My Space page and it's sort of sad to read the "About" section of his profile, because it sounded like he had high hopes for a musical comeback. When I scrolled down the page, I read some of the comments left by people whose lives were touched by him. I wonder if he knew?

http://www.myspace.com/tonythompsonmusicpage

News story on Tony Thompson's Death

Hi-Five performing I Like the Way on Soul Train

Charles Nelson Reilly, R.I.P.

While channel surfing this morning, I came across an episode of "Match Game" on GSN. I then went to the digital cable guide and found that they were showing "Match Game" episodes all day. So I say to myself, "cool, I can work on my radio show and watch a little Match Game". When they went to commercial break, I found out why they were doing the marathon... because of the death of Charles Nelson Reilly. When I went on Wikipedia, I found out that he died on May 25th from pneumonia.

Chances are if you grew up in the 1970s like I did, one of things you looked forward to afterschool was catching the antics of Gene Rayburn, Charles Nelson Reilly, Brett Somers, Richard Dawson and the rest of the Match Game "ding-a-lings" (as Gene would say). One of the highlights of the show were the barbs that the cast (especially Brett and Charles) traded back and forth.

It's also fun to see if you can spot which episodes were taped after lunch. As some of you Match Game fans may know, they taped several shows a day with a break for lunch in between. During lunch, the celebs would often partake in potent potables (pardon the Jeopardy reference). This led to the last few episodes of the week having an even looser feel to them. Watching it now also makes it even more apparent that kids today are alot more sophisticated than most of us were back in the day. Although he certainly never tried to conceal it, CNR's sexuality never occurred to me when I was a kid.

In addition to his game show appearances, kids of the 1970s also may remember CNR for his contributions to Saturday morning TV. From 1971-73, he appeared as the evil magician Horatio J. HooDoo on "Lidsville". This Sid & Marty Krofft production also starred Butch Patrick (aka Eddie Munster) as a teenager who fell into the hat of Merlo the Magician and arrived in Lidsville, a land of living hats. The hats on the show would have the same occupations as the humans who would normally wear them (for example, a cowboy hat would act like a cowboy).

Unless you remember seeing this show, you might be saying to yourself "Malcolm, you are making this shit up!". In addition to the living hats, one of the things that sticks out in my mind about "Lidsville" is CNR's portrayal of Hoodo and the fact that he flew around in a big hat (his "Hatamaran" ).

CNR was also the star of "Uncle Croc's Block", which aired on ABC from 1975-76. Although I watched it on a regular basis when it originally aired, I don't remember much about it given that I haven't seen it since then. Given that "Uncle Croc's Block" was a spoof of children's TV (a forerunner to Pee Wee's Playhouse), most of it probably went over my head.

Some CNR-related links for you to check out:

Match Game: Time To Separate the Children

CNR Hosts Match Game

Match Game: Snow White Question

CNR appearance on Here's Lucy

The Opening and Closing Credits To Lidsville

It Was 40 Years Ago Today...

On June 1st 1967, arguably the greatest LP in rock history was released... "There's A Kind of Hush All Over the World" by Herman's Hermits. Seriously, I am talking about the Beatles "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". Because it has been 40 years since its debut, it's easy to forget just how innovative "Sgt. Pepper" was on so many levels. It was the 1st rock album to have its lyrics printed on the back cover. "Pepper" was also the 1st LP to have its tracks segue into one another, without the customary space in between.

Being great and influential does have its drawbacks. The success of "Sgt. Pepper" probably inspired many artists to make ill-advised jumps onto the psychedelic bandwagon. My guess is that The Stones prefer that we pretend that "Their Satanic Majesties Request"never even existed.

The 1st time I heard "Sgt. Pepper" in its entirety is when a college fling (thank you Shena!) gave me her copy. The funny thing is that I didn't even ask her if I could have it. I was in her dorm room checking out her record collection and came across "Sgt. Pepper". I think I let out something along the lines of "Ooh, Sgt. Pepper!" and she asked ME if I wanted it! My "Ooh" can probably be attributed to the fact that not only did I know the album was a classic, but I didn't expect to find "Sgt. Pepper" when her collection was littered with the likes of artists such as Barry Manilow and Shaun Cassidy. When she offered me "Sgt. Pepper", I did ask her if she had any idea what she was giving away. Come to think of it, the copy she had may have been given to her by her older brother so she didn't give a damn.

Unfortunately, I no longer have the vinyl copy that Shena gave me. Even though I have many of the "Pepper" tracks on other Beatle compilations, I might have to break down and buy the actual CD. It'll be cool to hear "Sgt. Pepper" again... from the opening crowd noise/band tuning up all the way through that final piano chord.