Tuesday, June 05, 2007 Rant Archive
Stay away from the risotto; the broth apparently tastes like “gnat’s piss.” And, the accompaniment to the chicken dish might be actual human snot. I’d stick with the fish in HELL’S KITCHEN.
While preparing to watch the season premiere of HELL’S KITCHEN, I made a brown rice dish with ground turkey, then I made my 4-year-old daughter cry. I did this with a purpose; to spiritually align myself with celebrity chef and HELL’S KITCHEN host/judge, Gordon Ramsay. This is the start of the show’s third season and the formula is tight: 12 contestants (with varying degrees of experience in food service) compete to please the bad-boy chef with the potty mouth for the chance to win their own restaurant. The show revels in bleeped-out foul language, emotional breakdowns and backstabbing. It is buttery summer nonsense and utterly enjoyable.
Those who were looking for a happy ending to the first season finale of THE RICHES probably knew they weren’t going to get what they wanted. I mean, what’s the best-case scenario? That they keep on living as this dead family whose identity they have stolen? That they get the heck out of town and make it to Mexico before anyone finds out? Not quite the fairy-tale ending anybody wants.
And, unfortunately for the show’s loyal -- if not large -- fan base, there wasn’t much resolution either.
As the finale begins, the real Doug’s best friend, Pete, is waiting for some answers from the imposter family. After an awkward meal filled with carbs, a whole lotta hot air, made-up explanations and faux philosophizing from Wayne and Dahlia, Pete ends up in Doug’s car, on the way to find him in the middle of the woods. This is where Wayne “explains” that he’s a hit man hired by Doug to protect his family. And, Pete almost believes it, until he sees that the hired gun is packing a water pistol. So, Wayne does what he probably should have done in the first place: He knocks him out and drags him home.
CREATURE COMFORTS is a documentary-like television show that Michael Moore might have made. If he had absolutely no sense of humor. And was a veterinarian.
I wish I was at the pitch meeting for this new animated CBS series. It must have gone something like this:
Producer: I have a great idea. Let’s survey average people on a variety of subjects and then — now get this, because this is the fun part — why not take what they say and put it into the mouths of animals?
Network Exec: I don’t know. I don’t get it.
Producer: But it’s a hit in England.
Network exec: Oh, then it must be good. We’ll take it.
How else to explain how this only intermittently amusing (that’s amusing, not funny) show made it to the air of what once was known as the "Tiffany Network?" As you read this, William Paley is not turning over in his grave, he’s spinning on a rotisserie.
Three seasons in, ENTOURAGE has the process of turning over-the-top Hollywood glitz into the everyday down to a science. The Season 3 finale starts with the four guys sharing a final joint on the balcony of their multimillion dollar home. They nonchalantly talk about how Vince did not, in fact, have sex for $60 million the night before. So, that gives closure to the previous episode’s cliff-hanger, but now how is he going to finance his dream project, “MEDELLIN”?
Because this is ENTOURAGE we’re talking about, the answer to that question (or any, for that matter) is no more than 22 minutes away. We find out that Billy Walsh will helm the picture. You might remember him as the eccentric, pain-in-the-ass director of “QUEENS BOULEVARD.” Well, as it turns out, he’s now making porn films out of his house. During a dinner with Nicky Rubenstein — ENTOURAGE doesn’t shy away from making the frugal movie producer Jewish in every imaginable way — Walsh convinces Rubenstein he can make MEDELLIN for $30 million.