Open Mic | TVWeek

Chuck Ross

It’s Memorial Day Weekend. How About Spending Some of Your Time With a Movie About Which One Reviewer Said “Its action…is thrilling, and its subtle emotional content grips the heart. Its quiet tone of patriotism stirs deeply.” We Concur and Add that this Oscar Nominee for Best Picture Is Also One of the Best Movies We’ve Ever Seen

The quote in the headline comes from The Hollywood Reporter, which also said of this movie, it “packs tremendous wallop.” The movie is “Twelve O’Clock High,” the 1949 war classic that received a well-deserved Best Picture Academy Award nomination. This…

May 23, 2015

Hillary Atkin

‘Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck’ Fills in the Gaps About a Fallen Rock Icon

It’s been 21 years since Kurt Cobain’s suicide, but the fascination with the legendary lead singer, guitarist and songwriter of Nirvana is stronger than ever. The man and his music continue to enthrall not just people who experienced the groundbreaking…

May 4, 2015

Hillary Atkin

‘A Crowd Gathers That Is Half Female’ — Make a Note of It

Conquering discrimination in the entertainment industry, whether that bias in hiring practices is conscious or not, is a difficult and complex topic. The subject engendered a frank and sometimes painful discussion as the Writers Guild of America, West hosted a…

Apr 29, 2015

Hillary Atkin

Why Jill Soloway — the Creator of ‘Transparent’ — Has Never Watched Her Show on Amazon, Which Distributes It, and Other Secrets of High-Powered Showrunners

A few secrets from Jill Soloway, creator and executive producer of Amazon Studios’ “Transparent”: “I used to say ‘marijuana’ [when someone asked me what I need to write], but that’s not true anymore,” Soloway said, as the audience erupted in laughter. “Pot doesn’t make the writing…

Apr 17, 2015

Chuck Ross

It’s Easter, the Perfect Day to Watch One of the Most Popular Musicals Ever: ‘Easter Parade’ with Fred Astaire and Judy Garland. Though It was Supposed to Have Starred Garland and Gene Kelly

“Easter Parade” the classic 1948 musical, is on today, Sunday, April 5, 2015, on TCM at 8 p.m. ET, 5 p.m. PT, uncut and with no commercial interruptions.You can also currently stream it using Amazon Instant Prime. The hoopla…

Apr 5, 2015

Hillary Atkin

HBO Goes All In on Sinatra Documentary

Start spreading the news. It’s been 100 years since the birth of one of the most famous people in American pop culture — and the family of Frank Sinatra wanted to mark the centennial of the legendary crooner’s birthday in…

Apr 3, 2015

Hillary Atkin

Director Behind HBO’s Controversial ‘Prison of Belief’ Speaks Out

Several months before it was scheduled to be seen on premium cable by a large national audience, the Church of Scientology took preemptive action against “Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief,” a documentary exposé directed by Alex Gibney,…

Mar 30, 2015

Chuck Ross

It’s Movie Time! This Year Marks the 50th Anniversary of An Astonishingly First-Rate Screenplay. And Even Though the Resulting Movie Won the Oscar for Best Picture of the Year, No One Else Will Be Writing About This Until 2020. Why We are Jumping the Gun

David Lean, often the most dazzling of directors, was once asked about the main characters in his two war epics, “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Bridge on the River Kwai”: “Characters like T.E. Lawrence or Colonel Nicholson seem to be…

Mar 28, 2015

Hillary Atkin

Was It the Most Politically Incorrect Comedy Central Roast Yet?

Out of all the people that Comedy Central has ever roasted — and we’re talking about everyone from Joan Rivers to Pamela Anderson to William Shatner to Charlie Sheen, James Franco and Donald Trump — Justin Bieber could be the…

Mar 26, 2015

Chuck Ross

Bombshell: Former Major Media Agency CEO Says Kickbacks Totaling At Least $100 Million Are Pervasive Among U.S. Media Agencies. How This Became a Top Priority for the Association of National Advertisers. We Talk to a Source Who Says Yes, the Allegations Are True. And We Interview Jon Mandel, Who Gave the Blistering Presentation Last Week That Set Off this Bombshell. It’s a TVWeek Media Investigation

If the courting of controversy got Ted Turner dubbed the Mouth of the South, Jon Mandel is easily the Mouth of Madison Avenue. For more than 30 years Jon was at Grey Advertising and then its media agency, MediaCom, where…

Mar 13, 2015