Bernie Brillstein wasn't a household name like Bernie Mac or Isaac Hayes -- as a talent manager and producer, his work was all strictly behind the scenes -- but his vast impact on entertainment shouldn't be forgotten amid this weekend's tragic showbiz losses. Brillstein, who died Thursday night at 77, had a hand in countless classic TV and film projects, from Sesame Street to Saturday Night Live to The Sopranos, and he guided the careers of numerous top stars and scriptwriters.
Brillstein helped launch the Muppets on TV when Jim Henson became his client. As a manager for Lorne Michaels and many of the early SNL players, he was also instrumental in launching SNL and many of its stars' early movies, from Animal House to The Blues Brothers to Ghostbusters. He was an early exemplar of the automatic "executive producer" credit, which he would earn not for his creative input on the set, but for setting up the deals that made a movie or TV series possible by putting his writing and acting clients together in a project. At one time or another, he represented such actors as Brad Pitt, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Sylvester Stallone, Adam Sandler, Geena Davis, Nicolas Cage, Richard Dreyfuss, Peter Falk, George Wendt, David Spade, and Rob Lowe, as well as such writers as SNL's Alan Zwiebel and The Bob Newhart Show's Tom Patchett and Jay Tarses. Among the works he produced or got off the ground were Hee Haw, Alf, It's Garry Shandling's Show, The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, Dangerous Liaisons, The Steve Harvey Show, Happy Gilmore, The Cable Guy, Mr. Show with Bob and David, Politically Incorrect, Just Shoot Me, and Newsradio. His company, Brillstein-Grey (his partner was future Paramount chief Brad Grey) was behind such series as The Larry Sanders Show and The Sopranos.
Nikki Finke of Deadline Hollywood Daily has a nice tribute to Brillstein here. The best, tribute, however, may be in his own memoir/Hollywood advice tome, Where Did I Go Right?: You're No One in
Hollywood Unless Someone Wants You Dead. Musing on who could play him in a movie version of the book, the beefy, white-bearded Brillstein told EW, "It could be anyone from Johnny Candy if he was
still alive to Kenny Rogers if he were a little fatter. Though I
might hold out for Robert Redford."
Can you guys do me a quick favor? Just click on this link and tell me if you see the same story that I see there, because I'm starting to think it might be an addled byproduct of the flu-y symptoms I have coming on at the moment.
What I'm seeing: They're making a movie called Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Undead, starring underappreciated Sopranos alum John Ventimiglia (pictured) as a Shakespeare-adapting playwright/vampire. (Artie Bucco! As a vampire!) The supporting cast includes another of my all-time favorite character actors, Jeremy Sisto, as an incompetent cop, and Ralph Macchio as a mobster, which pretty much speaks for itself. And the film's being scored by Sean Lennon, another underrated fave of mine.
All in all, I give this project a 20% chance of actually existing in the fact-based world. What do you say — is that Hollywood Reporter story there on the other end of that link, or did my flu-like virus make it up? And if it's true, are you half as excited about it as I am?
I'm a just bit underwhelmed after watching last night's SAG Awards. From the collective "Who let those guys back in?" groan (re: The Sopranos winning everything), to the part in the middle where something meaningful was taking place but I fell asleep, to a Tom Cruise sighting during which he barely raised his voice, let alone sounded wacko... it all evoked a big "meh" from me. Better make that a big "blërg," in honor of SAG winner and lover of lunch Liz Lemon (and, of course, our own Dawnie Walton). The ceremony wasn't bad. It just wasn't awesome, aside from Daniel Day-Lewis' speech and Angelina's boob almost falling out on the red carpet. We're sorry to those (two) of you who wanted a live blog; instead, here are PopWatch's highly subjective Best and Worst moments of the evening...
BEST MOMENTS
• Jane Krakowski's dress (pictured). It looked like Dippin' Dots.
• Quote of the night, from Tina Fey: "You've just given an award to a hat rack."
• Lifetime-achievement-award recipient Charles Durning redeeming himself (and Burt Reynolds' pushiness) by greeting his microphone: "Hello, mic!" Then, during his standing O, Durning's wheelchair-bound wife apologetically mouthing, "I can't get up!" It was pretty sweet.
• Daniel Day-Lewis' speech was just perfect. He talked about daring to "go back into the arena one more time, with longing and self-doubt jostling in the balance," and then somehow easily segued his way into a tribute to Heath Ledger, citing him as one actor whose work inspired a sense of regeneration in him. "In Monster's Ball, that character that he created seemed to be almost like an unformed being, retreating from himself, his father, this life — even us, and yet we wanted to follow him." Powerful stuff, and so classy.
• Tina Fey, Jenna Fischer, and Julie Christie all alluded to the WGA strike in support of writers and out-of-work production crews during their acceptance speeches.
• Javier Bardem looked -- and sounded -- so hot.
Honorable Mention: Ruby Dee's glasses
Check out the evening's worst moments after the jump.
Did you know that the one-of-a-kind mind responsible for The Sopranos belongs not to show creator David Chase, not to star James Gandolfini, not even to real-life ex-con Tony "Paulie Walnuts" Sirico (pictured) — but to a former municipal judge and prosecutor named Robert Baer? Neither did I. But Chase is in court this week defending himself against that very claim. According to Baer, the landmark HBO series— probably the single richest, most complex English-language work of art in the past 30 years — sprang from "services he provided to Chase during a three-day tour of northern
New Jersey and subsequent conversations in 1995." So now, he argues, he's entitled to a piece of the multi-million-dollar action.
Now, maybe this is just me, but if you're a judge who goes around giving screenwriters in-depth tours of the New Jersey mob-land and inspiring sympathetic looks at a vicious career criminal's inner life, wouldn't that sorta not be the kind of thing you'd want to advertise to your colleagues in the legal profession?
Last week, Yahoo announced that Britney Spears topped the portal's 2007 list of its users' top 10 search queries. Other individuals in the top 10: Paris Hilton (No. 3), Beyoncé (No. 5), Lindsay Lohan (No. 6), Fergie (No. 9), and Jessica Alba (No. 10). Which made me wonder: what would the list look like for EW.com's search engine this year? According to our internal tracking, these were the 10 most popular searches this year on EW.com:
1.Lost (pictured) 2.
Heroes 3.
The Office
4. Stephen King 5.
Sopranos
6. "Doc Jensen" 7.
24
8. Harry Potter 9.
American Idol 10.
The Hills
Britney doesn't appear until No. 49.
What does this mean? First, that you guys really, really like Lost. (No. 6, of course, refers to EW.com essayist Jeff Jensen's Lost-centric "Doc Jensen" columns.) Second, you really like TV, more than movies (only Harry Potter — and maybe, Stephen King — count in that direction) and more than music (only Idol qualifies there). Third, you're much more interested in projects than in celebrities; the only real-life individuals in the top 10 are both EW columnists. Finally, you're not much interested in gossip.
Tell us, who or what have you searched for this year on EW.com? What pop culture searches do you find yourself conducting most often, here or elsewhere?
8:00 p.m. Slow clap: L-Yeah! L-Yeah! Oh wait, sorry, gonna try to be neutral here for at least five minutes. Em-my! Em-my! Em-my!
8:01 p.m. Seeing that this Family Guy medley isn't actually live, you think they could've come up with funnier stuff than a Charlie Sheen pedophilia joke and a bit about the age of the Desperate Housewives ladies. That said, rhyming Zach Braff with "doesn't have to make you laugh" made me chuckle. A little.
8:02 p.m. Oh Fox, so classy with that closeup of T.R. Knight during the Isaiah Washington Joke.
8:05 p.m. Uh-oh. Ryan's trying to be funny. And the audience is trying to be nice and pretending to laugh. But seriously, my dream of a shtick-free Emmys -- where every acting nominee gets a 30-second pre-awards highlight clip is about six minutes away from flatlining.
8:07 p.m. Tell me I did not just hear a Hayden Panettiere age-of-consent joke in the first 10 minutes of the telecast.
8:10 p.m. Maybe Ray Romano said something funny during that technical glitch where they cut to the ceiling? 'Cause I'm not really laughing at any of this mess.
8:11 p.m. Okay, that bit about Romano's sexual encounters ending the
same way as The Sopranos' final episode…that was kinda priceless.
8:13 p.m. I liked Jeremy Piven better when he was on Cupid. And I'm not just saying that because he beat Rainn Wilson.
I'm a little outside the age demographic for Elmo's Christmas Countdown, a holiday special airing on ABC this winter, but I may watch anyway, just for the Sesame Street Muppet's human costars. And I don't mean Ben Stiller, Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Hudson, Alicia Keys, Sheryl Crow, Brad
Paisley, or Ty Pennington. No, I'm waiting for the sketch in which, according to The Hollywood Reporter, Sopranos alumni Tony Sirico and Steve Schirripa (pictured, left and right) will play Bert and Ernie. I can't wait for the scene where Bert gives Ernie a beat-down with a rubber duckie for getting cookie crumbs in the bed. Should be good clean yuletide fun for the whole family. And by "family," I mean... well, you know.
The Television Critics Awards, bestowed Saturday night in Los Angeles, is an odd event: Praise and prizes handed out to stars and producers, some of whom have been savaged for their earlier shows by newspaper, magazine, and online scriveners. There's an air of false bonhomie — not so much over who'll win, but whether some producer will take a punch at some critic who panned his or her previous creative effort. Even the winners seemed ambivalent. Producer Jason Katims, overseer of Friday Night Lights, winner of "Outstanding New Program," said in his acceptance speech that, in the wake of Lights' shutout in the Emmys nominations (to many critics' and fans' published dismay), "Thank you for the experience of being so publicly snubbed."
David Chase, making a rare public appearance since the conclusion of The Sopranos, accepted "Outstanding Achievement in Drama" prize by invoking the Beatles' White Album: "Here's another clue for you all — the walrus was Paulie Walnuts." He also offered, for anyone baffled by his gangland show's oblique ending, this nicely self-deprecating explanation of his thought process. Recalling that while he was a student at Stanford University, he saw Planet of the Apes, and upon its conclusion, said he turned to his companion and said, "Wow, so [the apes] have a Statue of Liberty, too!" "So that's what you’re up against," he said with perfect dryness. Chase, clearly feeling a little defensive about criticism of The Sopranos' ending, turning to the TV critic from the Newark Star-Ledger, Alan Sepinwall, and said, "I'm from New Jersey; you're from New Jersey... explain to the people that it is entirely possible to be sitting in a restaurant in New Jersey and everybody just stops."
The Office producer Greg Daniels noted that as of this Saturday night he was on page 450 of the final Harry Potter. Awards ceremony host John Oliver (pictured), the Brit-born correspondent for The Daily Show, observed that over the weekend, while President Bush endured a colonoscopy, for three hours, Dick Cheney was the president, and therefore, "we should be thankful we are all still alive," that "colors should be more vivid," and we should appreciate our existence. That, and the fact that Friday Night Lights lives to risk both excellence and being snubbed for another season.
Only 10 days left till this year's Emmy nominations are announced — which means two things: My left kidney will soon be deposited on a shrine dedicated to Vanessa L. Williams' very necessary nod, and the good folks at Gold Derby are getting their leak on. Last week, while I was on vacation, the site reported the rumored list of 10 finalists still in the running in the Best Drama and Best Comedy Series categories, and on Friday, a pair of judges who'd attended screenings of various nominated episodes spilled the beans about which series are most likely to hear their names called when nominations are announced July 19. (Click here to read the full scoop.) According to that duo, Best Drama Series nominees are likely to include The Sopranos, House, Grey's Anatomy (pictured), 24, and Heroes, while the Best Comedy Series race could come down to Two and a Half Men, Entourage, 30 Rock, Ugly Betty, and The Office. If Gold Derby's sources predicted correctly, that would mean snubs for the remaining five drama (Boston Legal, Dexter, Friday Night Lights, Lost, and Rome) and comedy finalists (Desperate Housewives, Extras, My Name Is Earl, Scrubs, and Weeds).
Considering how many Grey's Anatomy and 24 fans feel those respective series are coming off weak seasons, their inclusion among TV's five best drama series seems a little surprising. And if a sci-fi show is destined for Emmy recognition, shouldn't Lost (or Battlestar Galactica, which apparently didn't even crack the top 10) get Heroes' slot? On the flip side, if 30 Rock, The Office, and Ugly Betty score Best Comedy nominations (as predicted), I'll be hard-pressed to feel my usual brand of post-nominations outrage. Unless, of course, L. Yeah doesn't get her due. Then I'll be hellaciously upset.
What do you think of Gold Derby's list of predicted nominees? Should the Emmy judges have read the PopWatch Fantasy Emmy Nominees Gallery before going to work? Holla back!
Three more items that indicate no loss of interest in The Sopranos, more than two weeks after the series ended:
• First, the hoaxster behind the nutty "Nikki Leotardo" theory about the final sequence, a clearly bogus interpretation that circulated all over the 'Net in the hours after the finale aired, has finally come clean.
• Second, over the weekend, I had occasion to dine at Holsten's, the Bloomfield, N.J. ice cream parlor/diner where the final scene was filmed. (Even tried — and failed — to parallel park in the spot across the street where Meadow struggled to squeeze her car.) The place is much smaller than it appeared on TV (it's one long, narrow room that seats maybe 40 people, tops), there are no Journey-blasting jukeboxes on the tabletops (those were just props), and the onion rings are decent but not all they're cracked up to be. (The ice cream, however, which is made on the premises, is excellent.) Still, I had to order the rings, as did everyone else in the joint, which was full of tourists snapping pictures of themselves sitting in the Soprano family's booth and buying commemorative Holsten's/Sopranos T-shirts. (The flow of tourist dollars is surely silencing the local naysayers who didn't want the Mob drama to film in their burg.) Clearly, this malt shop is going to be a shrine to which Sopranos fans will make pilgrimages for years to come.
• Finally, Steven Van Zandt (pictured) has emerged from Silvio's coma to return to two of his many day jobs: advocate for unsigned rock bands and columnist for Billboard. In an editorial last week, Little Steven urged directors of TV commercials to use more unsigned rockers in their ad soundtracks. Which raises the question: How many of you have ever been turned on to an unfamiliar musical act because you heard their tune in an ad? And how many of you have purchased a song because you liked it in a commercial? Show of hands, please, below.
Okay, so a few days ago, I wrote a little blog thingie about how I might have inadvertently reunited Journey with Steve Perry (pictured), the singer we all know was responsible for catapulting the band to rockstar status in their 1980s heyday. My "proof" that this history-making event was upon us? Both Perry and guitarist Neal Schon had made we've-gone-our–separate-ways puns in recent interviews, so of course that meant they were letting bygones be bygones and reassembling after Schon and keyboardist Jonathan Cain let go their latest singer, Jeff Scott Soto. It seemed obvious to me (and my editors) that my pseudo-intertextual-analysis/crystal-balling was meant as ONE BIG JOKE. But apparently, irony is no match for the fiery passion of Journey fans, who have been flooding the internets with theories of how and when and why the Perry-Journey reunion will take place. Word eventually got back to the ex-frontman himself, and on June 21 he posted a message stating that he has "no such plans whatsoever" to get back with the band. "What you have heard is only a rumor. I'm truly sorry for any disappointment this rumor may be causing," he wrote.
Now, I'm not presumptuous enough to think that my silly little post was the sole cause of said rumor. But if I somehow added to the brouhaha, then oh, woe is me! 'Twas never my intention to seriously raise the hopes that the ex-bandmates would run back to each other with open arms (d'oh!). And now — sigh — there are brokenhearted Journey devotees like PopWatcher Bruce in NC, who was ready to "un-mothball my denim jacket with the Escape scarab patch ironed onto the back."
Certainly by now you have seen the painfully embarrassing Hillary Clinton spoof of the Sopranos finale on her presidential campaign site (a video we critiqued last week here). The clip of her and ex-Prez hubby Bill sitting down in a diner booth a la Tony and Carmela was rigged up to announce the winner of her online campaign song competition. To make the whole stiff parody more cringe-inducing, the tune that her supporters picked — over ones by the likes of U2 and KT Tunstall — was Celine Dion's "You and I." (Yeah, prepare for a really long election year, people.)
In the parody clip, the role of the menacing guy who passes the seated couple on the way to the bathroom, perhaps to pick up a pistol stashed Michael Corleone-style, is played by an actual Sopranos star, Vincent Curatola, a.k.a. Mob boss Johnny "Sack" Sacramoni. We caught up with Curatola at last week's EW 100/Must List party to ask him what his reaction to the video was...
Stereogum has a great TGIF time-waster: Instead of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'," you can plug in any Web-hosted song to serve as the soundtrack for the final scene of The Sopranos. (Yes, everyone's still talking about this. PopWatch reader Jane points out yet another brilliant parody. Guess it'll be at least another few days before we're all tired of this.) I started subbing in some promising choices of my own, but I kept getting discouraged that many of them were too short (the clip is 3:44). "Happiness Is A Warm Gun" was a perfect fit — especially "I need a fix 'cause I'm goin' down" which was obvs a reference to the onion rings — but it was way too short. (PopWatch's Gary Susman recommends the Pretenders' "Thin Line Between Love and Hate," Elvis Costello's "Clubland," and Lou Reed's "Perfect Day," with its 'You're going to reap just what you sow" refrain.) So I scrolled through my iTunes to find songs that are exactly 3:44 that might work, and uploaded a few you can use. Just paste the URL into the "play it" box and be patient while the two sync up. Very patient.
"Just What I Needed," the Cars — This song goes well with any scene, even in real life. The ambiguous possible hitmen really need to stop wastin' all Tony's time (time).
"Feel Good Inc.," Gorillaz — The evil cackling is such a bonus. The rap breakdown that greets AJ -- not so much.
And finally and perhaps most shamefully (unless you're my kind of person) — Ace of Base's "Living In Danger." HELLO! Tony also sees lies in the eyes of a stranger! Phenomenal.
The watercooler arguments continue about the controversially ambiguous Sopranos finale, but the folks at TonyIsDead.com are convinced that the Mob boss didn't survive the blackout; check out their website and let us know whether you find their evidence persuasive, and whether you'd buy their T-shirt.
You may have hated the ending, but veteran TV comedy scribe Ken Levine (Frasier, M*A*S*H) reminds us, in this hilarious blog post, that it could have been much, much worse — if The Sopranos had been a network show instead of an HBO series. So stop whining.
It was inevitable that parodies of the final scene of The Sopranos would start turning up on the Web. Max Silvestri created our favorite so far. (Which we found at Lindsayism.) Seen any better ones? Take us to 'em.
I was never a fan of Journey. I mean, I have nothing against them. I do remember riding in the backseat of my mother's blue Pontiac one wintery night in 1983, when I was 8, hearing "Open Arms" on the radio and thinking it sounded so incredibly grown-up and awesome to be in love. And like just about every child of the '80s, I'm sure I nervously slow-danced to "Faithfully" at one of my sixth-grade school dances. Still, I never owned any Journey albums or dreamed of being serenaded by Steve Perry while I wore a white dress with orange tights and he air-guitared a broom. (Yes, I know that "Oh Sherrie" was solo Perry, thanks.) So it was kind of odd to find myself on the Journey beat this week, interviewing both guitarist Neal Schon (who's been Journey-ing faithfully — heh heh — since 1973) and ex-lead singer Steve Perry about The Sopranos finale. Which, in case you just landed on this planet, featured "Don't Stop Believin'" in the last scene.
But even stranger, PopWatchers, is that I might just have reunited the masters of '80s arena rock to the lineup that we all remember. The day after I spoke with ex-bandmates Schon and Perry (separately, of course, since they split kinda unamicably in 1998), what do I find in my e-mail inbox but a press release announcing that the current incarnation of Journey has let their latest Perry replacement go. His name is Jeff Scott Soto, and he himself was a substitute for the original Perry stand-in, Steve Augeri, who ended his journey (sorry! the puns just write themselves!) last year due to an illness. "We appreciate all of Jeff's hard work," blah, blah, blah, said Schon in a statement. "We've just decided to go our separate ways..."
I'm almost sorry we're still talking about this, but then again, Sunday's Sopranos finale drew almost 12 million viewers, making it the second most watched show on broadcast or cable last week (behind only America's Got Talent). Anyway, while viewers continue to rewind their DVRs in search of clues, we can put a few burning questions to rest, now that series creator David Chase has briefly broken his silence, and now that Adriana herself has spoken to EW.com.
"Anybody who wants to watch it, it's all there," said Chase — who's granted one and only one post-finale interview, to Alan Sepinwall, TV critic at New Jersey's own Star-Ledger newspaper — about possible clues in the finale. He insisted that the purpose of the blackout was not to frustrate viewers or to leave the door open for a Sopranos movie, a project he said he doubts he will ever be inspired to write. Beyond that, he said he wants the episode's content to speak for itself. "I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding to what is there."
Ah, to breathe the air of the Bowery Ballroom again. I left New York some two and half years ago and headed west to sunny Los Angeles, but I can't count the number of nights, back when I was a Lower East Side girl, that I spent watching bands play the Bowery — or toiling away in the downstairs bar. Last night, I found myself back at the old haunt, but to catch my new hometown's favorite sons, Maroon 5, as they continued their club tour. Given the industry-heavy crowd the guys played for at L.A.'s Troubadour last week (yes, I was at that show, too), I was surprised when, walking up Delancey St., I noticed a ridiculously long line of actual fans. Inside, the scene was no different. People filled every inch of the room in what was certainly a warm welcome from an often jaded venue.
Truth be told, I haven't seen the Bowery this packed since I caught the Coldplay show where Chris and Gwyneth first made eyes at each other. Maroon 5 inspired sheer pandemonium in the room, kicking off with their very first hit single, "Harder to Breathe" and their latest, "Makes Me Wonder." Say what you will about their brand of funk-infused pop, but on this night, Maroon 5 simply rocked.
Let's leave aside, for now, the question of whether, with that final blackout, David Chase's refusal to provide narrative closure or any kind of moral reckoning for Tony and Carmela was a fan-frustrating cop out or a true-to-life affirmation of the show's existential thematic concerns. (We discuss that question at length here.) After all, you surely have plenty of additional unanswered questions. As do we. EW's reporters will try to find answers to some of these; others are almost certainly unanswerable. We'll get you started after the jump; if there's anything we've forgotten to ask, add your own questions in the comment section.
What do you want to see Tony and the remaining Sopranos clan (all 1.5 of them) chow on, Last Supper-style during Sunday's finale? It's tough. They've made some outstanding achievements in the consumption of cured meat, but there were also baked pastas, bialies, johnnycakes, a hilarious sushi phase, and that scaly fish that was also Big Pussy. I say they just pile all the MVPs into a sundae dish in the style of a Pizza Hut's New Pizza Lovers Pizza Topped With Smaller Pizzas, then garnish it with a freshly seared sausage off Tony's grill (pictured, plus ghost). Whatever they end up eating, the final scene will supposedly take place in the Glutton's favorite ice cream parlor, Holsten's. YUM.
In other Food & Drink Friday news, I'm leading a boycott against Mrs. Beasley's cupcakes for catering to Princess Paris.
Won't you join me? It's really easy. You just buy cupcakes from any
other bakery. I'm doing really well so far! It helps that I've never
heard of it and don't live in L.A.
If you're already feeling premature Sopranos withdrawal, or if you enjoyed today's EW.com gallery of the show's most memorable whackings, or if you're still reeling from Sunday's bloody penultimate episode, then perhaps this online Flash game is for you. Called The Ultimate Hits, it takes the form of a scavenger hunt in a Jersey dump filled with mementos from the show's major murders. (It's like Clue, except instead of Mrs. Peacock in the conservatory with the candlestick, the killer is probably Phil Leotardo in the motel room with the pool cue.) This sort of online game isn't really my cup of marinara, but I'd be interested to hear what you think of it, PopWatchers.
(Warning: If you still haven't seen Sunday's episode of The Sopranos — and you must! — there are spoilers ahead.)
Show of hands, everyone: during the final scene (pictured) of Sunday's Sopranos, how many of you heard Tony's final shout as "I get it!"? On first viewing, that's how I heard it, as a peyote-induced epiphany. But then, I read a number of recaps whose writers heard Tony say, "I did it!", as if he were confessing to the abyss that he killed Christopher. (Or as if he were exulting in triumph at having broken his long gambling losing streak.) Going back to the DVR, I replayed the scene several times, and given James Gandolfini's mushy diction, I couldn't tell whether he said, "I get it!" or "I did it!"
Now, the official recap on HBO's site says I was right the first time (as was EW.com TV Watcher Lisa Schwarzbaum). But I like the idea that Gandolfini and David Chase put the ambiguity in there on purpose. Has Tony found enlightenment, of the sort that seemed within his grasp after his coma-induced hallucinations? Or has he finally taken an honest look at his own long, lethal list of crimes and sins and acknowledged his wrongdoing — which could itself be a step toward enlightenment?
Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who released a 2001 album I didn't know existed called Here to Heaven, owned up to its shortcomings. "I was part of it — but I hated every moment of it. I was faking it the whole time," she told Vegas magazine. Pretty sure she's still more than happy to keep your money.
I guess we can't include this in Trend Watch, since the last PopWatch-documented apology by a star for her crappy music came all the way back in January, but I'm digging the honesty here, Meads. And might I suggest a revised version of Track 04 — "He Wouldn't Listen To My Dreams (Have Fun at Dental School, Asswipe remix)" — as the soundtrack to the deleted scene of her and Finn breaking up?
I've never blogged before. I've been too scared to. The mere thought of setting up a Typepad account kept me awake at nights. But if there's anyone I would overcome my fear for, it's Katie Couric. Particularly when it involves the cause closest to her heart, the fight against colon cancer. So when I heard about her Strike Out Colon Cancer event, held last night at the newly-relaunched 300 New York bowling alley at Chelsea Piers, I decided now was the time to lose my blog-inity.
Katie gathered a few hundred of her closest friends, including Whoopi Goldberg, The Sopranos' Steve Schirripa and John Ventimiglia, and Queer Eye's Kyan Douglas for the event. For each strike anyone bowled, 300 New York would donate $1,000 to the National Colorectal Cancer Research Alliance (NCCRA). I love bowling but I'm horrible at it, so my goal was to score just one strike so that my attendance wasn't completely useless. My first few frames were pretty pathetic. But luckily for us, they hired the dashing former pro bowler Brian Voss to give us a few pointers. After Brian showed me his four-step technique, I hit not one, not two, but three strikes. Hear that, Katie? Three thousand bucks! No need to thank me; it was my pleasure.
When life hands you lemons, make limoncello. Give Danny DeVito (pictured) credit for finding a way to turn his embarrassing, liqueur-fueled appearance last November on The View into a profit center. Instead of apologizing for overindulging in the citrus cocktail behind those six minutes of train-wreck TV, he's marketing his own brand of limoncello. We applaud Mr. DeVito and hope other celebrities learn from his example. After all, rehab-averse chanteuse Amy Winehouse really ought to have her own wine house. Similarly, Mel Gibson should brand his own tequila. ("It's Apocalycious!") And Rush Limbaugh could market his own OxyContin and Viagra. ("Talent on loan from Pfizer.") The possibilities really are endless...
UPDATE: Great marketing minds think alike. The Sopranos now has its own limoncello drink. It's a soda, so even 12-stepper Christufuh can enjoy it.
A rock star is someone who can light up a crowded room just by walking in. So what do you call someone who can do that to a room full of, well, rock stars? Last night, the answer to that question was "Mr. President" — Mr. Former President, to be exact. There were tons of stars at Chelsea Piers' Pier 60 for the Food Bank for New York City's annual awards dinner and auction, which raised over $1 million for the deserving charity, but the celeb other celebs wanted to hang out with was William Jefferson Clinton.
An EW colleague and I grabbed the first empty seats we could find in the spacious dining room, only to discover that we happened to have landed directly next to the mother of all power tables. Just a few feet from our elbows sat Bill himself, along with cool, confident daughter Chelsea (sporting a "Hillary '08" button); U2 guitarist The Edge (pictured, center, with Jimmy Fallon, left, and David Bowie); Elvis Costello and Diana Krall; Iman and Bowie; and wealthy producer (and Liz Hurley babydaddy) Steve Bing. Sadly, the room was too noisy for us to overhear what appeared to be an uproarious, non-stop banter session between our lofty neighbors, though we did catch a glimpse of proud new papa Costello showing Clinton some snapshots of his and Krall's infant twins.
Bill took occasional breaks from chatting to sip his Diet Coke and enjoy speeches from chef Mario Batali, former SNL-er Fallon (one of the night's two major honorees), and R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe. (For details on the all-new music that Fallon's working on, check EW.com's exclusive news story.) When he finally ascended to the podium to make his own speech, the room erupted in cheers. What followed was a fleeting taste of classic Clinton — some disarming humor, some stirring calls for social justice, and some truly impressive words of praise for the night's second major award recipient, The Edge. "U2 has been particularly good to me," Clinton said. (He's a fan? Who knew?) He reminisced about meeting the band in Dublin 12 years ago, when they gave him an inscribed copy of William Butler Yeats' plays, and he waxed poetic about The Edge's instantly recognizable guitar tone. "In my opinion, there is no way he can ever get enough credit for the success of U2," he said, "and there's no way he'll ever get enough credit for the goodness in his heart."
As soon as The Edge accepted the award with a short speech of his
own and returned to his table, star after star rushed over to pay their
respects to him and Bill. "Sorry to interrupt," Denis Leary offered as
he darted eagerly between the pair. Josh Hartnett came over to shake
Bill's hand, too. "It's like meeting the pope or something," he gushed
to me a few minutes later. (In fact, Hartnett clarified, this was the
second time he'd had the pleasure — they golfed together in Jamaica
last year.)
We got up for a stroll around the room and soon bumped into a series of A-listers, who shared all kinds of tantalizing tidbits:
(Warning: Mild spoilers ahead from last night's episode of The Sopranos.)
Amid last night's particularly dark episode of The Sopranos came some simpler pleasures, courtesy of a little slasher flick called Cleaver. That's right — Christopher Moltisanti's first venture as a filmmaker, the ultraviolent Mafia revenge saga he once pitched as "Saw meets Godfather II," finally wrapped, and Chrissy proudly screened it for the whole famiglia.
Unsurprisingly, the film's premiere helped revive an assortment of barely-buried tensions within its audience, thus advancing the show's inexorable march towards a dramatic crisis. It also provided an occasion for a deliciously meta subplot in which Tony uncomfortably contemplates his resemblance to the potbellied, bullying boss on the big screen; he might as well have been watching a few key episodes of The Sopranos. (Despite Tony's feelings of betrayal over Chrissy's apparent celluloid insult, his behavior seemed notably restrained last night, as if Chase wanted to remind us that he's not always the bloodthirsty lunatic he became in Christopher's cinematic imagination.) Most of all, though, Cleaver gave us this season's first laugh-out-loud funny moments. Just like Christopher and co-producer "Little" Carmine Lupertazzi's pre-production hi-jinx last year, the scenes we saw from the movie provided a welcome respite from the steadily mounting sense of dread in every other aspect of the series.
A little more comic relief arrives in the form of a making-of mockumentary which HBO has put together for the fictional film. An ad at the end of last night's episode promised that "Making Cleaver" would air tonight, but thanks to the good folks at YouTube, it's already online. (You can check it out after the jump.) The featurette includes deadpan interviews with producers Chris and Carmine, director Morgan Yam (whose use of the phrase "B-movie fanboys" throws those two for a serious loop), and star Daniel Baldwin, who plays himself as the actor who takes on the role of ill-fated boss "Sally Boy." It's an amusing watch, no doubt, and it sorta makes me wish I could see Cleaver in all its glory.
A) Easter Sunday's debut of The Sopranos (Christofuuuuuuuuuh, pictured, wants you to get caught up on all the immorality right here.) B) Coca-Cola halts production of an Italian movie in which Jesus drinks a can of Coke in the desert. I don't get it... don't Italians love Jesus? And Coke is way more refreshing than holy water. Shouldn't this be a win-win? C) Helen Mirren's elevator scene in The Long Good Friday. It won't move unless you press the button, you know. So press it. D) I find all of the above so appalling that I think I'll head over to EW's evergreen Jesus gallery instead.
Before the final Sopranos season kicks off on April 8, check out this rapid-fire compilation of all six years condensed into 7:36! This guy covered pretty much everything important, plus that time Meadow wanted to take a lamp to college. Oh, Meadow. Favorite parts:
Repeat footage of Carm kicking Tony out — four times
Hot Italian student — "She wasn't real"
Tony's mom smiles... then dies. "No one cares."
"Still fat"
Johnny finds his wife with Twix bars
"Meadow dates the goofiest guy in the world." Really, who was that guy?
The only other part I wish he'd mentioned is when, after the long pre-season 6 hiatus, we found out Tony and Carmela had joined the suburban sushi bandwagon in full force. "Can I get another sake?" Can you think of anything he left out? (I was clearly grasping for straws there.)
EW.com Associate Picture Editor Connie Yu was doing research for an upcoming Sopranos gallery when she came across these two photos of the family; at left, as they appeared when the series debuted in 1999, and at right, as they appear now, going into the final season. We were struck by how much the kids have changed in eight years. Yeah, duh, but still, it seems like only yesterday when Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) was a cheerful high school chorister beginning to think about college, and A.J. (Robert Iler) was just a budding juvenile delinquent. Ah, good times.
Che peccato! Ex-Sopranos turncoat Vincent "Big Pussy" Pastore said "Fuhgeddaboudit!" to Dancing With the Stars today, after just one week of training for the show's March 19 premiere. Commented the Associated Press, "Tony Soprano’s hitman-turned-informer is living up to his nickname." Now, settle down, AP! The 60-year-old actor has every right to step out of the strenuous competition before he's unceremoniously whacked yet again (well, by the judges and viewers) on national TV. Honestly, we all know, he never was going to win.
Still, Pussy's pass leaves a hole in DWTS's fourth-season cast: Laila Ali, Billy Ray Cyrus, Clyde Drexler, Joey Fatone, Shandi Finnessey, Leeza Gibbons, Heather Mills, Apolo Anton Ohno (he's gonna win, duh), Paulina Porizkova, and Ian Ziering. Not a cuddly big lug among them! ABC is mum on whether Pastore's spot will even be filled, but that doesn't keep us from asking: Who should replace him? Maybe ... Joseph R. Gannascoli (a.k.a. the late, gay Vito)? Or, I dunno, what's Sinbad up to these days?
A. The Sopranos' Joe Gannascoli, a.k.a "Gay Vito," claiming to come out with his own line of pool sticks (to refresh your memory, Vito was raped and beaten to death with one this past season).
B. Is R. Kelly finally returning to his epic "Trapped in the Closet" saga of music videos? Looks like it, according to this casting call.
C. Tori Spelling (pictured) has agreed to write her memoirs while filming an Oxygen reality show where she and her husband run a bed and breakfast.
PopWatch HQ buzzes with excitement at James Gandolfini’s new production deal, which his new production company set up to create cable series and feature films for the HBO/New Line joint venture Picturehouse. He’s already got a Hemingway biopic in development, with himself in the lead. But what else should the ex-Mobster play, once he’s firmly ensconced in the Hollywood witness protection program also known as the multi-platform development deal?
Let’s leave aside the Gandolfini dreams of yesteryear: Presumably, he’s no longer interested in a Gleason biopic or Honeymooners remake, having watched the latter project morph into a ho-hum Cedric the Entertainer movie. Some voices around here want him to play a porn king, an eavesdropping plumber -- sleazebag lummox roles, in other words. I’m sure he’d knock them out of the park.
But for my money, I’d like to see Gandolfini assay a massively popular evangelist; not one of those badly toupeed, toothy TV healers of old, but a Rick Warren type: the very image of a regular middle-American guy who just so happens to command a flock of millions and a massive republic of faith. (Warren wrote The Purpose-Driven Life.) We want to see Gandolfini in charge. We want to see him conflicted. We want to see him wielding moral authority of one sort or another -- wielding it well, wielding it badly, dealing with the consequences. And this gives us all of the above, in a decidedly un-Sopranos milieu.
What do you think? How would you put the Big G to work?
I feel bad for Daniel Baldwin. Not just because of his most recent troubles, but because he's the Baldwin brother with the weakest brand identity. You know, Alec is the Talented One, William is the Slickly Handsome One, Stephen is the Goofy One, and Daniel is... uh, you know, the one who was on Homicide for a couple seasons a decade ago. I'm not sure being cast in an imaginary-movie-within-a-TV-show is going to help much, but even a minor role on The Sopranos is sure to get Daniel B. more positive press than anything he's done in years. Besides, aren't you curious to see how Christopher's Saw-meets-Godfather II Mob-sploitation movie turns out?
Delay is in the air: First PopWatch gets hung, then the final leg of The Sopranos gets pushed to March 2007, three months after its previously declared debut. Other reports suggest that it's all a matter of scheduling -- something about movie debuts and Rome (back Jan. 7) and The Wire (returning Sept. 10). It all adds up to The Sopranos coming back in March... at the earliest.
Sound fishy? Yeah, I thought so too. Sopranos is a Sunday-night-or-nothing proposition, as far as the programmers (and, probably, David Chase) go. I get that: It's prime real estate, and they're not going to cede it. They'd rather wait. Still... I detect the distinct odor of backroom negotiations here. You wouldn't think HBO would let arcane matters of scheduling get in the way of The Final Episodes of The Greatest Show Ever, would you? Perhaps this is the network's way of backsassing Chase after years of bending over for him: You're out, and now that you're out, we're no longer building the whole network around you. Or maybe there's still some holdout going on.
Personally, I can wait. I'm used to it. What I can't wait for is season 4 of The Wire. It won't be the same without the late, great Stringer Bell, but c'mon, McNulty walking a beat? That's going to be great. Bring it, Wire! Flood me with characters! Snow me with plot points! Refuse to condescend! Jersey, schmersey -- I'm ready to go back to Bodymore, Murdaland.
Like music-video trivia? Or pictures of smokin' celebrity stud muffins talented male thespians? Then you'll want to check out AOL Music's extensive ''You Gotta Start Somewhere'' gallery (Superman's in there!). I knew, for example, that Josh Holloway got an early break in an Aerosmith video, but didn't recall CSI: Miami's Adam Rodriguez jonesin' for J.Lo in "If You Had My Love" or Josh Duhamel popping up in Xtina's "Genie in a Bottle." And just wait till you see which actor's name was "Luka." Who knew?
Imagine a Sopranos without Dr. Melfi and Meadow! Wait, you don't have to imagine: That was season 6. Okay, imagine a Sopranos without Melfi, Meadow, A.J., Paulie Walnuts, Silvio, and Bobby Bacala. You might be imagining season 7 (season 6.5?), if a salary dispute among the actors and HBO isn't resolved. The aforementioned posse feel left out of the series' spoils, and this is their last chance to cash in. Thus: hardball. So far, neither side seems willing to give.
Golly, this might mean beginning the eight-ep finale season-ette with awkward lines about "poor Bobby, eaten by Janice, f---in' tragic," or "poor Paulie, turns out there was an unresolved storyline lodged in his prostate, f---in' tragic," or "poor Silvio, turns out he was really Stevie van Zandt from the E Street band, f---in' tragic."
Oh, who are we kidding? It'll come down to the wire, a settlement will be worked out, the usual. There are too many storylines at stake. Unless, of course, HBO makes separate deals with separate players and union-busts 'em.
Just in case this gets really ugly, we've drawn up a storyline that ought to resolve HBO's problem.
FADE IN
EXT. NEW JERSEY
Melfi, Meadow, A.J., Paulie Walnuts, Silvio, and Bobby Bacala all go into a store. Pan up to name of store: DYNAMITE STORE
CLERK: Hey, you there! Yeah, you, the Italian stereotype! There's no smoking in he---
[Note: HBO, if you want to use this, just gimme a call, I'll tighten up the dialogue a bit, and we're golden.]
But this all raises the question: Which of the above characters could you live without?
Oh, how we've missed Julianna Margulies! Her departure from ER (and, aside from Ghost Ship, the mainstream) left a Margulies-shaped hole in our lives. Now, with her stint on The Sopranos apparently concluded, we're left Margu-less until, yes, Snakes on a Plane. Check it! She's credited!
Still, speculation is rife that she'll return to Soprano-land next year, perhaps in a pivotal role. Our very own blogfather (a.k.a. Papa Blog, Der Blogvater, and "Snuggles") has theorized from the beginning that her character, inexplicably Tony-attuned real estate agent Julianna Skiff, is actually an undercover FBI agent. While last night's ep kinda blew this theory away (just slip that sawbuck under my door, Mickey), many suspect she'll be a star witness in the ever-culminating RICO case against Tony when the series returns next January. (The theory goes: She'll use Chris to get to Tony and destroy them both.)
Wish I had time to weigh the merits of these theories, but I'm hard at work on my Ghost Ship sequel, Ghost Bus. (The hook is, if the bus drops below 50 miles per hour, the ghosts will sign on to make Ghostbusters 3.)
[WARNING: The following item contains shockingly fake spoilers and no useful information whatsoever.]
HBO, you TiVo tease! Look at your official summary of the Sopranos season finale (Sunday, 9 p.m.): "Tony (James Gandolfini) gets Carmela's (Edie Falco) career back on track; Chris (Michael Imperioli) picks up where Tony left off; AJ (Robert Iler) gets a work perk; Phil (Frank Vincent) won't let well enough alone." Excise the proper nouns, and this could be the description for a particularly unmemorable According to Jim. Oh, HBO, you cunningly prosaic bastards. Your nonchalance only whets our appetites -- for wild speculation!
1. From the "Carmela's career" tidbit, I can only surmise that Tony enrolls Carmela in the DeVry Institute, where she learns that she can't play the next great video game... because she hasn't invented it yet! Epiphanies about accounting and typewriter repair soon follow.
2. "Where Tony left off." Hmmm... where did Tony leave off? Shish-kebabbing Ralphie way back when? No, he was pretty thorough there. Getting serviced by that Bada Bing dancer? Nope, mission accomplished. I've never seen Tony clean his gutters though. Maybe Chris will bring some closure to Tony's longstanding yard-waste problems. That would be... electrifying.
3. "Work perk"? Well, let's see, last we heard, AJ was entering the construction industry at the basement level. I could see a man walking away from that gig with a whole lot of "free sand," if you know what I mean. (What I mean is: He might get some free sand.)
So yes, OK, I'm stumped. But then comes this -- like a plate of ziti in the wilderness -- a "leak" from Frank Vincent (pictured), who plays acting New York boss Phil Leotardo, a.k.a. Vito's executioner. Sure, he didn't actually wield the pool cue. But he was there. On the bed. Looking, well, a little keyed up, shall we say.
[WARNING: OKAY, THE FOLLOWING MIGHT ACTUALLY BE CONSIDERED A SPOILER.]
So Vincent says he hopes to return for the final eight episodes next January. Says he's "in negotiations." We can take this one of two ways: He's coming back, so clearly, he'll survive the coming bloodbath that began with Vito's execution. Or he's "in negotiations," meaning his reappearance is negotiable. Meaning he might only appear in dreams or visions. Meaning... he's dead.
Or, more than likely, this is all just a big tease.
Vincent also calls the finale "memorable" and "explosive," and said we'll thank him on Monday for telling us this. Whatever you say, Frank. You're the boss. For at least the next four days.
In honor of E3, we present a walk-through of the newly announced Sopranos videogame. It won't be out until holiday-season 2006, but we have, rather improbably, obtained a copy.
First off, press down-down-up-up-left-right-left-right-select-start to begin the game with unlimited subplots. (Hold down "B" for "secretly gay.")
Press start, and find yourself in a first-person perspective. You are Sopranos creator David Chase. In front of you stands HBO. HBO has a backpack full of cash. It's asking you for six more seasons. HBO can only be defeated with the "Carnivale Obscurity Cannon," and you don't have one, so just take the money.
Next, Lauren Bacall jumps out. Hit her in the face. Then check your tone gauge to see if this was funny, shocking, or just dumb.
Here comes Vito... what stereotypically gay thing should he cotton to this week? Broadway shows? (Hold down "R," press "X.") French cuisine? (Hold down "foie," press "gras.") Exfoliating? (Rake controller over back, loofah-like. Press "M" to moisturize.)
Paulie can only carry so much story-weight as a character, but you can increase his capacity by getting him a bigger Cadillac. Do this before going through the door marked "Remember that Russian guy from the Pine Barrens?"
The "B" button is for "boobs," when you need to transition via the Bing.
Ready to fight the Boss? Good, because Gandolfini's renegotiating his pay package.
Oh, Artie. Look how far you've fallen. Booze andcoke? Sheesh, why not throw in a hooker and a bag of White Castles? But it wasn't the fictitious chef Artie Bucco, but the very real John Ventimiglia (pictured) who was charged with DUI and drug possession last night.
Unfortunately, Bucco is just the latest Sopranos cast member to run afoul of Johnny Law. The list is long: In hunting up talent for the great Gambino-Cheever family reunion that is The Best Show Possibly Ever, creator David Chase and his cohorts have an uncanny knack for casting future offenders. The alumni's aggregate charges and allegations running the gamut from robbery to murder to minor fashion violations. (And these are just the young'uns. Our friend Tony "Paulie Walnuts" Sirico was a stickup artist back in the day.)
Guys, the authenticity is breathtaking. The meta-media-ness of it all is striking. The indictment of the American privateer spirit, scalding. I'm impressed. I'm confused. I'm starting to think maybe Christafah really did hit Lauren Bacall in the face. But where does it end? And does this give credence to critics who say the show traffics in ugly stereotypes? Or does it just mean I should wear Kevlar to the wrap party?
I am invited, right? C'mon! I jaywalk! I'm an incorrigible rock-paper-scissors cheater! I have "Smooth Criminal" on cassette!
Joe Gannascoli (pictured) has given an number of interviews lately in which he congratulates himself for his enlightened attitude, as if the straight actor had done something personally or professionally brave by playing Vito Spatafore, the outed gay Mafioso on The Sopranos.
His arms must be tired from all that patting himself on the back, but Gannascoli does deserve credit for coming up with the idea himself to make Vito gay. Not only did that idea give the actor more face time on the show than if he'd remained just another hitman sitting around in the shadowy corners of Tony's office, but it also added a genuinely new twist to the Mafia mythology.
I know some viewers have grumbled that his storyline, including his exile in a quaint New England town, is a distraction from the main action in New Jersey, but I've been fascinated by Vito's story, as ladled out in the ''Live Free or Die'' episode two weeks ago and in last night's ''Johnny Cakes'' episode.
You can read more about Vito, including some mild spoilers about what's in store for his family, in this extensive interview with Gannascoli at AfterElton.com. Again, a little too much self-congratulation, but I loved his Soprano-esque line about his newfound fame: ''Listen, I would have [performed a particular sexual act] a long time ago if I knew this was going to happen.''
The Oscar-winning actor Ben Kingsley (pictured, at right) appeared on The Sopranos last night, playing himself. The fictional Kingsley is shown taking meetings with highly dubious "producers," who are peddling him a highly dubious film.
There are times when self-parody becomes uncomfortable for all of us. This is one of those times. Lest any of you forget, Ben Kingsley said yes to Bloodrayne. He said yes to Thunderbirds and Spooky House. Sure, he also says yes to The House of Sand and Fog and Sexy Beast. But for every good choice, there is an equal and opposite Sound of Thunder (or equivalent).
So the Sopranos producers made a very wry choice in selecting Kingsley, a pedigreed actor who continues to command respect, yet has a rep for taking anything that comes along. How horrible must Chris' script be, then, if Kingsley turned it down? For the love of Ed Wood, the man has worked with Uwe Boll!
Next on The Sopranos: F. Murray Abraham? And Dyan Cannon getting kicked in the stomach?
Whatever Big Love put in the water over there at HBO, it's catching: Now Tony Soprano has multiple wives.
One we know (the very real Carmela). One is just a voice on the other end of a phone call in an increasingly immersive dream sequence experienced by a comatose Tony.
To recap: Tony was shot by an addled Junior, is hospitalized, and is -- as Billy Crystal put it in The Princess Bride -- "mostly dead." In his (probably oxygen-deprived and permanently damaged) mind, Tony imagines himself a law-abiding salesman for a defense contractor, marooned in a sterile business hotel when his wallet and briefcase are switched with those of another traveler. He calls his wife for advice and sympathy -- but it's not his wife. Not the one we know anyway.
So who is it?
Some say Charmaine Bucco (Katherine Narducci), restauranteur Artie Bucco's wife, crazy Gloria Trillo (Annabella Sciorra), or dear, departed Adriana (Drea de Matteo). But HBO, speaking to the New York Post, says it's none of the above. The actress on the phone, they say, is "not famous enough" to be identified by Sopranos fans.
Them's fightin' words! If they're giving us the old "move along, nothing to see here," I think it's time to begin the paranoid speculation, don't you? What is the Internet for otherwise?
My guesses, in this order:
1. Either Laurie Williams or Leila Robins, the actresses who have played Livia Soprano in her younger days. (Freudians, rejoice!)
2. Valerie Plame, re-establishing her cover by posing as an obscure actress
Home
Bernie Brillstein wasn't a household name like Bernie Mac or Isaac Hayes -- as a talent manager and producer, his work was all strictly behind the scenes -- but his vast impact on entertainment shouldn't be forgotten amid this weekend's tragic showbiz losses. Brillstein, who died Thursday night at 77, had a hand in countless classic TV and film projects, from Sesame Street to Saturday Night Live to The Sopranos, and he guided the careers of numerous top stars and scriptwriters.
Can you guys do me a quick favor? Just click on 
I'm a just bit underwhelmed after watching last night's 
Did you know that the one-of-a-kind mind responsible for The Sopranos belongs not to show creator David Chase, not to star James Gandolfini, not even to 
Last week, 
8:00 p.m. Slow clap: L-Yeah! L-Yeah! Oh wait, sorry, gonna try to be neutral here for at least five minutes. Em-my! Em-my! Em-my!
I'm a little outside the age demographic for 
The Television Critics Awards, bestowed Saturday night in Los Angeles, is an odd event: Praise and prizes handed out to stars and producers, some of whom have been savaged for their earlier shows by newspaper, magazine, and online scriveners. There's an air of false bonhomie — not so much over who'll win, but whether some producer will take a punch at some critic who panned his or her previous creative effort. Even the winners seemed ambivalent. Producer Jason Katims, overseer of Friday Night Lights, winner of "Outstanding New Program," said in his acceptance speech that, in the wake of Lights' shutout in the Emmys nominations (to many 
Three more items that indicate no loss of interest in The Sopranos, more than two weeks after the series ended:
Okay, so a few days ago, I wrote a little blog thingie about 
I was never a fan of Journey. I mean, I have nothing against them. I do remember riding in the backseat of my mother's blue Pontiac one wintery night in 1983, when I was 8, hearing "Open Arms" on the radio and thinking it sounded so incredibly grown-up and awesome to be in love. And like just about every child of the '80s, I'm sure I nervously slow-danced to "Faithfully" at one of my sixth-grade school dances. Still, I never owned any Journey albums or dreamed of being serenaded by Steve Perry while I wore a white dress with orange tights and he air-guitared a broom. (Yes, I know that "
I'm almost sorry we're still talking about this, but then again, Sunday's Sopranos finale drew almost 12 million viewers, making it the second most watched show on broadcast or cable last week (behind only America's Got Talent). Anyway, while viewers continue to rewind their DVRs in search of clues, we can put a few 
Ah, to breathe the air of the Bowery Ballroom again. I left New York some two and half years ago and headed west to sunny Los Angeles, but I can't count the number of nights, back when I was a Lower East Side girl, that I spent watching bands play the Bowery — or toiling away in the downstairs bar. Last night, I found myself back at the old haunt, but to catch my new hometown's favorite sons, Maroon 5, as they continued 
WARNING: Spoilers from last night's 
What do you want to see Tony and the remaining Sopranos clan (all 1.5 of them) chow on, Last Supper-style during Sunday's finale? It's tough. They've made some outstanding achievements in the consumption of cured meat, but there were also baked pastas, bialies, johnnycakes, a hilarious sushi phase, and that scaly fish that was also Big Pussy. I say they just pile all the MVPs into a sundae dish in the style of a 
(Warning: If you still haven't seen Sunday's episode of The Sopranos — and you must! — there are spoilers ahead.)
Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who released a 2001 album I didn't know existed called Here to Heaven, 
I've never blogged before. I've been too scared to. The mere thought of setting up a Typepad account kept me awake at nights. But if there's anyone I would overcome my fear for, it's Katie Couric. Particularly when it involves the cause closest to her heart, the fight against colon cancer. So when I heard about her Strike Out Colon Cancer event, held last night at the newly-relaunched 
When life hands you lemons, make limoncello. Give Danny DeVito (pictured) credit for finding a way to turn his embarrassing, 
A rock star is someone who can light up a crowded room just by walking in. So what do you call someone who can do that to a room full of, well, rock stars? Last night, the answer to that question was "Mr. President" — Mr. Former President, to be exact. There were tons of stars at Chelsea Piers' Pier 60 for the 
Which is (or will be) the most blasphemous?
EW.com Associate Picture Editor Connie Yu was doing research for an upcoming Sopranos gallery when she came across these two photos of the family; at left, as they appeared 
Let's play "What's Weirder?"
PopWatch HQ buzzes with excitement at 
I feel bad for Daniel Baldwin. Not just because of his 
Delay is in the air: First 
Imagine a Sopranos without Dr. Melfi and Meadow! Wait, you don't have to imagine: That was season 6. Okay, imagine a Sopranos without Melfi, Meadow, A.J., Paulie Walnuts, Silvio, and Bobby Bacala. You might be imagining season 7 (season 6.5?), if a 
Oh, how we've missed 
[WARNING: The following item contains shockingly fake spoilers and no useful information whatsoever.]
In honor of 
Oh, Artie. Look how far you've fallen. 
Joe Gannascoli (pictured) has given an number of interviews lately in which he congratulates himself for his enlightened attitude, as if the straight actor had done something personally or professionally brave by playing Vito Spatafore, the outed gay Mafioso on The Sopranos.
The Oscar-winning actor Ben Kingsley (pictured, at right) appeared on The Sopranos last night, playing himself. The fictional Kingsley is shown taking meetings with highly dubious "producers," who are peddling him a highly dubious film.
Whatever Big Love put in the water over there at HBO, it's catching: Now Tony Soprano has multiple wives.
