All right, that’s it. I have had it with the Studio 60 hating, Scott Brown of EW.com! It is all so easy! Yes! It’s idealistic television! Yes, the sketches aren’t funny! Yes, Aaron Sorkin is writing a thinly veiled dream version of his life! And you know what? I freaking love it, and I’m not afraid to say so. You think people who worked in the White House thought West Wing was anything but a unicorn cloud festival that completely distorted everything they did every day? No! So why should we be surprised that those of us who dwell in the unicorn cloud festival of pop culture should think Studio 60 anything other than preposterous?
I’ll tell you why I like it: because it shows me Hollywood the way it SHOULD be. Because it poses the possibility that television– much like government– has the potential to do immense good, and that those in charge must only seize control of that opportunity. And because I love Bradley Whitford, Matthew Perry, Amanda Peet, Timothy Busfield, Nate Corddry, Steven Weber, Christine Lahti, and even slurpy little Sarah Paulson. They could get together every week and read VCR instructions, and I’d still watch, if it was lit right.
So can we give the pro-Studio 60ers a little piece of the floor now? Frankly, I think people are scared to watch this show for fear they accidentally fall in love with one or more characters and find themselves ostracized from the media elite. Well, I’m not. I LOVE THIS SHOW.
Thank you, That is all.
(After the jump, see the flame war that erupted in EW’s TV department over Whitney’s defense of Studio 60.)
Dalton Ross: Finally! I have some company in Scott Brown. I’ve been saying for months how weak I thought this show was, but was a lone voice in the wilderness. All the characters are smug and unlikable.
Kristen Baldwin: They lost me at "You look like one of them, but you talk like one of us."
WP: But… But… how is the idealism here ANY different than the idealism of West Wing? I mean, a bunch of characters sitting around saying things like "I serve at the pleasure of the president"?? Do you think Condi Rice and Tony Snow clasp each other on the shoulder and say that sort of thing very often? I just think because TV is expected to be inherently devoid of value, people can complain this show is over the top… but think about one of Scott’s big complaints about this week: that Amanda Peet turned down a ratings bonanza of a reality show in favor of an artistic sitcom. Well, maybe I’m wrong, but — isn’t that the sort of thing we are BEGGING networks to do every single day?
KB: But watching a show about network execs making the "right" choices while music swells in the background isn’t inspiring — it’s just a little awkward and boring, especially when it’s presented with such gravitas you’d think they were healing AIDS babies or something.
WP: Maybe, Kristen, healing AIDS babies starts with decent network TV. We just don’t know.
DR: I don’t know, but I just wrote a pilot for my own hour-long primetime drama where a bunch of people keep trying to convince me to throw my old newspaper in the trash can, but I decide to gallantly do the right thing and carry it over to the recycling bin instead. (Working title: Big Blue Bin.) The sad part about it is that the stakes are actually higher in mine than in Studio 60.
Tim Stack: Dalton, the first episode should be pretentiously titled "The Long Crumple."
WP: I just think we all have a little bit of a double standard here. We roll our eyes and make gagging noises about Flavor of Love, but when something actually aspires to a higher goal, we tag it pretentious. Frankly, all good TV, in my opinion, is idealistic. (You think Friday Night Lights is really capturing the world of central Texas football?) But I’m done now.
TS: I actually like Studio 60 AND I like Flavor of Love. But at the same time, Studio 60 IS incredibly pretentious and talky and there is something obnoxious about Hollywood kissing its own ass. At least Flavor of Love is honest in its complete trashiness. There’s no pretense that it’s going to change the world.
Comments (1-30) of 78 Add your comment
Up with Flavor of Love, down with Studio 60!
whitney, I am SO totally with you.
I have had a heart on for sorkin since Sports Center, and the West Wing was my favourite show on television for a while. and I am loving Studio 60 too.
I don’t care what anyone else says, Bradley Whitford is amazing, and I would watch him read the nutritional content on a package of cereal….
Whitney,
Between your weekly chart reviews and your defense of Studio 60, I think you might be my long lost twin. I knew I had one out there somewhere!!!
Love me some Flavor of Love because it’s just so trashy and it knows it! Good ol fashioned fun.
Fun is what I feel is lacking from Studio 60. Yes, I know it’s a drama, but goodness, it’s just kind of like KB said above-boring.
I REALLY wanted to love this show. I adore the cast, worked in tv, appreciate pop culture, so I was just kind of disappointed by it.
It’s ok, not terrible, just not that exciting for me.
Whitney, for your sake, I hope NBC has faith in it.
I love Studio 60! Holla! Aaron Sorkin can throw anything at me and I’ll watch it. And if it wasn’t for this show, I’d be going through a severe Bradley Whitford withdrawal right now. Josh Lyman was my homeboy. So is Flav.
Thank you Whitney! I adore Aaron Sorkin for the same reasons you do, idealism should not be condemned. Although I don’t think Studio 60 is as great as The West Wing(one of the best shows of all time in my opinion) it is still better than most of the crap out there today. The networks fill our TV sets with the bottom portion of our own people, put up there so we can mock them of their stupidity. It’s not as if we don’t know this, we complain all the time about it. So what if Studio 60 isn’t perfect, at least it tries. When Jordan turned down that crappy reality show, I cheered…wishing any of the real-life execs had the same balls. Maybe it is a bit pretentious, is it wrong to be intelligent? We need more shows that make people actually listen to dialogue and use their minds.
If all this isn’t enough, the cast is amazing. Bradley Whitford can do no wrong in my book. Amanda Peet continues to grow on me. Matthew Perry is divine, and I actually like Sarah Paulson. I am rooting for Matt and Harriet.
Apparently I’m in the minority, but I think this show deserves to stay. So stand strong Whitney, you’re fighting the good fight…
Thank you Whitney! I adore Aaron Sorkin for the same reasons you do, idealism should not be condemned. Although I don’t think Studio 60 is as great as The West Wing(one of the best shows of all time in my opinion) it is still better than most of the crap out there today. The networks fill our TV sets with the bottom portion of our own people, put up there so we can mock them of their stupidity. It’s not as if we don’t know this, we complain all the time about it. So what if Studio 60 isn’t perfect, at least it tries. When Jordan turned down that crappy reality show, I cheered…wishing any of the real-life execs had the same balls. Maybe it is a bit pretentious, is it wrong to be intelligent? We need more shows that make people actually listen to dialogue and use their minds.
If all this isn’t enough, the cast is amazing. Bradley Whitford can do no wrong in my book. Amanda Peet continues to grow on me. Matthew Perry is divine, and I actually like Sarah Paulson. I am rooting for Matt and Harriet.
Apparently I’m in the minority, but I think this show deserves to stay. So stand strong Whitney, you’re fighting the good fight…
I like Studio 60. It’s good TV. Good acting and good dialogue.
Why do the sketches have to be funny?!? That is the lamest excuse for not liking a show. This show isn’t a comedy for godsakes.
The comedy is THE BACKDROP of Studio 60 and irrelevant. Is the artist style of painting Isaac does in Heroes reason to not like his character because it doesn’t follow proper technique?
It infuriates me the lame reasons critics come up with to dislike a show. Things like that make you sound like Comic Book Guy.
Whitney: Yes. You make some good points. I’m with ya.
Sports Night may have been one of the most intelligently written shows i’ve ever watched. since then, anything sorkin does gets my vote until proven otherwise. so far studio 60 seems to be alright, and as long as he keeps everyone verbose and snappy, i’m happy. ya dig?
I gave up on Studio 60, and I really tried.
Okay, so first I don’t watch Studio 60 because I’m pretty much over the whole Hollywood plays itself trend, but Friday Night Lights is actually the best thing that network television has done in, well, ever. Seriously. So I’m glomming on to Whitney’s oh so passing reference to it in hopes that everyone will watch it, and EW will read this and go, “yeah, and we should do a cover story on it because really everyone should be watching this instead of Dancing with the Stars.” Really. Dancing with the Stars? WTF?! So, Friday Night Lights. Good enough to save television. Watch it or you hate grandmothers and pie and kittens and america and you’re a terrorist.
Thank you so much, Whitney. Don’t let them get you down. I’ve been posting Scott Brown’s articles for the last few weeks trying to defend “Studio 60″. I actually posted one just this afternoon on his blog discussing how moved I was by some of the scenes in this weeks episode. I am extremely grateful that there is a show out there aspiring to be something more than the ridiculous, trashy reality shows and brain dead sitcoms I’ve been complaining about for years (with no one listening to me, I’d like to add). I’m so sick of falling in love with good tv shows only to have them be taken from me due to low ratings, and I am worried that I will be heading down that path again. But should the unthinkable happen, be brave Whitney, and all you other “Studio 60″ fans. There’s a place out there for us, somewhere, where we can enjoy more “pretentious” offerings of popular culture and not feel heckled by our peers. And if any of you find this place before I do, please let me know.
This show won me over with Monday night’s summit meeting featuring idealistic NBS president Jordan McDeere (Amanda Peet), overbearing network chairman Jack Rudolph (Steven Weber), and parent company chairman Wilson White (Ed Asner). The Bill Parcells quote and Jack’s response to it made my year, and I’m a Dallas Cowboys fan!
Talk about well-written television!
I was looking forward to Studio 60 and I really like the cast, but I just don’t find myself caring about the characters. But it is better than whatever else is on at that time.
Go Whitney!!!!!!!!!
I don;t get why most of the haters assume there has to be comedy involved – IT IS A DRAMA – comedy is not needed. I think the show is sharp and well writen – not as good a Grey’s but getting ther. Wasn’t SportsNight talky too??? but yet its almost the same idea and people loved that show. The problem is that people who think that the show is too “talky” also have this conception that it is “preachy” and for those of us who just enjoy the show as a television show, it does not preach. It reminds me of Six feet under where in the beginning the show was so so and then took off. Please NBC give this show a chance to spread its wings – it has potential.
Whitney, feel ya hon. But I don’t like the show because the charachters are bad and not at all likeable. the writing is great and so smart, i feel like at times i need a minute to digest what was said. i just think the charachters are crap, so i’ve checked out. But there are a lot of fans for the show, and a weekly review doesn’t seem that bad an idea. So, nuts to you ew staff!!!
I hereby demand that Whitney be assigned to do the NY1 television review because I have lost all respect for Dalton Ross.
I agree with Whitney. Stop finding lame excuses to not like Studio 60. “The comedy isn’t funny”, that is not the crux of the show, the show, like any other Sorkin project, is about the dialouge, the situations, the human interaction. Fans flocked to the West Wing despite the politics of the show, because it is simply good television. I, for one, do not care if the sketches on the show are funny, like I didn’t care that the sports stories on Sports Night weren’t real. I like Studio 60 because the actors are amazing and Sorkin could write dialouge that would make Flava Flav sound like a Harvard professor. Stop lampooning a show for attempting to be something other than a train wreck that apppeals to people’s desire to feel better than the idiots of our society. Television only provides a setting for another tremendous Aaron Sorkin show.
I love Studio 60. You have to ignore some of the preachiness of it and just enjoy the performances and storylines.
Thank you! While I have never been a hardcore fan of Sorkin, I am mortified that more people don’t realize this is the best new show of the year on any network bar none! Finally a show that is well-written, has interesting characters, makes us think, makes us laugh, and doesnt pander to the lowest common denominator. People, please, if you want to watch great sketch comedy get some Belushi or Ferrell SNL DVD’s or even better get Python or Kids in the Hall. This is a show ABOUT a sketch comedy show, so it is frightfully stupid to bad mouth the quality of the sketches they show JUST SO WE ARE AWARE they are working on a show. Even the people who write sketch comedy fulltime on SNL and Mad TV can’t do it. So get over it. Great cast, great writing, slow build to drama between fully-formed characters…I look forward to watching the show each and every week and it has became my wife and my favorite show of the season. Bravo!
Whitney, feel ya hon. But I don’t like the show because the charachters are bad and not at all likeable. the writing is great and so smart, i feel like at times i need a minute to digest what was said. i just think the charachters are crap, so i’ve checked out. But there are a lot of fans for the show, and a weekly review doesn’t seem that bad an idea. So, nuts to you ew staff!!!
I hereby demand that Whitney be assigned to do the NY1 television review because I have lost all respect for Dalton Ross.
Hang in there, Whitney. This blog should be backing intelligent programming and less time covering Paris Hilton burping. Raise your game, EW.
I love this show. It is so good, so good, so good! The show wants you to think, the show is witty, the show is smart, and it is just pure quality television, which is lacking on the 3 major broadcast networks. Which means that it will get cancelled soon, because that is how it goes. The show is too sharp and challenging to the general population and is therefore doomed because nothing good ever lives long on NBC. Sure, they air Joey for too many seasons, but a show like this, will not get a chance to find its niche. So sad really. Tragic.
I’m afraid I don’t understand why everyone keeps saying that the skits in the show aren’t funny. The Nancy Grace one this week was funny and my husband and I were both enjoying Nicholas Cage, your couples counselor. Honestly, if the real SNL was that funny, it would probably being doing alot better.
We love Studio 60, and I agree that I would watch Bradley Whitford read stereo instructions.
Ok, maybe I’m confused, but isn’t this show supposed to be a drama, not a comedy? If you’re watching the show for the sketches then you should watch the Tina Fey version.
The show is smart and witty and good television. The sad thing is that the people that enjoy don’t want to commit to it because odds are the networks will take it off the air before it has a chance to find an audience.
I don’t see the need to completely separate “Studio 60″ and “Flavor of Love”. After all, it’s pretty clear Sorkin’s writing all of Buck Wild’s dialogue.
OMG, I am so totally NOT with Whitney on this one. Studio 60 is sickenly pretentious and smug, and makes me gag every time I watch it. I agree 100% with Dalton, Kristin, and Tim’s opinions. Well said, guys.
I love this show. It is no more or less pretentious than the West Wing, it is just about something we seem to know more about.
Plus, I too, would watch these actors reading VCR instructions just to have them on my tube instead of some nitwit backstabber on Survivor, or Bachelor.