TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “Chemistry”

Katharine McPhee in SMASH - Season 1 - "Chemistry" | ©2012 NBC/Patrick Harbron

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: Jacquelyn Reingold Director: Dan Attias Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: March 12, 2012 Oh, for crying out loud! If there was ever a storyline that would make me want to dump SMASH, the affair between lyricist/book writer Julia (Debra Messing) and actor Michael (Will Chase), now heating up in “Chemistry,” would make me do it. Because there isn’t any chemistry between Messing and Chase. Because it’s just too tiresome that the one married character has to have an affair. Because it’s just too creepy the […]Read On »


COMMENTS (1)

TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “Let’s Be Bad”

Megan Hilty in SMASH - Season 1 - "Let's Be Bad" | ©2012 NBC/Will Hart

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: Julie Rotenberg & Elisa Zuritsky Director: Jamie Babbit Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: March 5, 2012 “Let’s Be Bad,” as an episode, is all over the place, but on the plus side, the SMASH writers have backed off on a couple cliches. They went hog wild on the others, though, including a final scene you could see coming from the back balcony far corner with restricted sight lines in that sound dead corner of the auditorium. We start out with Julia (Debra Messing) still behind on pages […]Read On »


COMMENTS (2)

TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “The Cost of Art”

Katharine McPhee as Karen Cartwright in SMASH - Season 1 - "The Cost of Art" | ©2012 NBC/Patrick Harbron

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: David Marshall Grant Director: Michael Morris Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: February 27, 2012 There is no getting around it that SMASH is a fun show to watch. The singing and dancing are wonderful fun. The original songs don’t suffer too much from Andrew Lloyd Webber syndrome (beating you over the head with soulful sappiness and the tendency to become insidious ear worms). In fact, the  featured production number in this episode “The Cost of Art,” I Never Met a Wolf Who Didn’t Love to Howl, […]Read On »


COMMENTS (1)

TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “Enter Mr. DiMaggio”

Megan Hilty and Michael Swift in SMASH - Season 1 - "Enter Mr. DiMaggio" | ©2012 NBC/Will Hart

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: Theresa Rebeck Director: Michael Mayer Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: February 20, 2012 The testament of a good show is to be able to turn it on, intending to watch a few minutes, and getting sucked in to watch the whole thing. That’s what happened while watching SMASH, the “Enter Mr. DiMaggio” episode. I was only going to check out how things held up after the first two stellar weeks, and well, I was sucked right back into the series. Of course, with the good, […]Read On »


COMMENTS (1)

TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “The Callback”

Megan Hilty in SMASH - Season 1 - "The Callback" | ©2012 NBC/Patrick Harbron

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: Theresa Rebeck Director: Michael Mayer Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: February 6, 2012 After an amazing premiere episode, SMASH settles into its second episode “The Callback” with the same great writing and directing and adds some more drama to the mix. Above all, the series knows who these characters are and the actors fit them like a glove already (and we’re only two episodes in). That’s rare in network television, but that speaks volumes for the work that went into creating SMASH. As the title […]Read On »


COMMENTS (1)

Exclusive Interview: Paul Blackthorne heads down THE RIVER

Paul Blackthorne in THE RIVER - Season | ©ABC/Bob D'Amico

There has been plenty of horror on television, and there have been pseudo-documentaries on television, but THE RIVER, airing on ABC Tuesdays at 9 PM, is the first narrative series to combine the two. With PARANORMAL ACTIVITY maker Oren Peli as one of the show’s creators, Michael R. Perry (PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2, STEPHEN KING’S DEAD ZONE TV series, MILLENNIUM) as its other creator and Steven Spielberg as one of the executive producers, the series arrived on the scene with plenty of genre street – or waterways – cred, even before proving itself to be truly scary in its first episode. In […]Read On »


COMMENTS (1)

TV Review: SMASH – Season 1 – “Pilot” – Series Premiere

Katharine McPhee and Megan Hilty in SMASH - Season 1 | ©2012 NBC/Mark Seliger

Stars: Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, Katharine McPhee, Jack Davenport, Angelica Houston Writers: Theresa Rebeck Director: Michael Mayer Network: NBC, airs Mondays Original Telecast: February 6, 2012 Of all the new TV series, SMASH seemed to be the least appealing to me. My initial perception, like many, that it was a more adult version of GLEE set in the world of Broadway. It looked like it had limited appeal across the board. Then something magnificent happened. I actually watched the pilot episode and was blown away. Granted, I am reviewing the “Pilot” episode, but since the second episode was […]Read On »


COMMENTS (9)

Exclusive Interview: SMASH producers Justin Falvey and Darryl Frank bring Broadway to NBC

Brian d'Arcy, Frank Houston, Jaime Cepero, Anjelica Huston, Jack Davenport, Katharine McPhee, Megan Hilty, Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Raza Jaffrey in SMASH - Season 1 | ©2011 NBC/Mark Seliger

Getting an original musical onto Broadway is an epic undertaking. Getting a scripted network TV series depicting the travails of getting an original musical onto Broadway magnifies that epic undertaking into what some might consider realms of sanity-challenging difficulty. However, NBC and executive producer Steven Spielberg are bringing forth SMASH, which premieres tonight, Monday, at 10 PM. SMASH is about the creation of a new musical about the life of Marilyn Monroe. Debra Messing and Christian Borle play the songwriting duo who launch the project. Anjelica Huston plays their hard-nosed producer and Jack Davenport plays the temperamental director. Megan Hilty and […]Read On »


COMMENTS (5)

Exclusive Interview: JUSTIFIED star Walton Goggins talks Season 3

Walton Goggins in JUSTIFIED - Season 3 | ©2012 FX/Frank Ockenfels III

JUSTIFIED, which has its third-season premiere tonight on FX at 10 PM, has brought the contemporary Western back to life. Originally based on Elmore Leonard’s short story “Fire in the Hole” and expanded from there, the series has been nominated for pretty much every award going, with Margo Martindale winning a Supporting Actress Emmy for her performance last season as country crime matriarch Mags Bennett. Leonard, an active creative participant in the series, has a new novel out, entitled simply RAYLAN. JUSTIFIED focuses on U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, who has successfully made a life away from […]Read On »


COMMENTS (2)

Movie Review: WAR HORSE

WAR HORSE movie poster | ©2011 Touchstone/DreamWorks

Rating: PG-13 Stars: Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson, Peter Mullan, Niels Arestrup, Tom Hiddleston, Benedict Cumberbatch, David Thewlis, Celine Buckens, Eddie Marsan Writers: Lee Hall and Richard Curtis, based on the novel by Micharl Morpurgo Director: Steven Spielberg Distributor: Touchstone Pictures/DreamWorks Release Date: December 25, 2011 Thematically, temporally and emotionally, if BLACK BEAUTY and SAVING PRIVATE RYAN had a cinematic offspring, it probably would be WAR HORSE. Using the Michael Morpurgo novel that also inspired the current Broadway hit of the same name, WAR HORSE is the story of Joey, a horse with a lot of heart and ability, and Albert […]Read On »


COMMENTS (13)
Increase your website traffic with Attracta.com

Dr.5z5 Open Feed Directory

bottom round