Burt Reynolds, Murray Hamilton, and Harry Dean Stanton are among the headliners in Bill S. Ballinger's suspenseful fifth-season "Escape to Sonoita," Jack's latest entry in the Hitchcock Project at bare•bones e-zine.
At The Twilight Zone Vortex, Brian talks about the contributions of an unsung TZ writer, Jerry Sohl, who ghostwrote three episodes of the series for his friend and fellow writer, Charles Beaumont, when the latter began suffering from the dementia that would eventually claim his life.
David always comes up with interesting angles at Comfort TV, and this one is definitely not comfort TV: the Lou Grant episode "Unthinkable," dealing with a topic that truly is unthinkable, though all-too-possible: nuclear war.
Television's New Frontier: the 1960s covers a police drama that I quite liked when I watched it as a blind buy a few years ago: Brenner, featuring Edward Binns and James Broderick. I was never a fan of Binns before this, but he is very, very good in this, and Broderick ain't bad either.
"A Year in TV Guide" continues at Television Obscurities, and this week the issue is from November 4, 1989, with a preview of the November sweeps programs, as well as coming video cassette releases (remember those?), and the week's highlights.
And at The Lucky Strike Papers, Andrew shares a quote from Attica Locke that says a lot about how the reader interacts with the book they're reading. I'd like to think it gives some food for thought to us writers as well. TV
Thanks for the shout-out as always, Mitch. And I also love the photos you find to illustrate these pieces - the one that tops this entry is particularly atmospheric.
ReplyDeleteIt does, doesn't it? I can't think of many things more comforting than lying on your bed in an old house, wearing your pajamas, watching TV. Next week's picture is a good one!
DeleteThanks, Mitchell!
ReplyDeleteDon't Shoot The Messenger Dept.:
ReplyDeleteWhen Dan put up the latest Eventually Supertrain podcast the other day, it fell to me to pass along the info that Bourbon Street Beat: "If A Body" was Nita Talbot's final BSB appearance as 'Lusti Weather'.
I tried to go easy, pointing out that had BSB gotten a Season Two pickup from ABC, that Lusti would have most assuredly come back … but I guess that's neither here nor there.
Anyway, Nita Talbot got another series gig that fall (1960), playing Jim Backus's assistant/sidekick/plus-one/whatever on The Jim Backus Show, a syndicated sitcom set in a very low-end news service (which made Carl Kolchak's office look like Reuters by comparison).
Funny show, actually; check it out on YouTube (and note the theme music by David Rose!).
As to Bourbon Street Beat:
The next episode in order is "Six Hours To Live", a pretty sharp show in its own right: check it out when the time comes.
True - had we looked ahead, we would have been able to share that information with everyone. But I think that's part of the appeal of what we do. We're watching the show as if we were watching it along with everyone else. With some exceptions - the W. Hermanos bit, for example - we try not to give things like that away. Certainly if we had been watching it back at the time, we would have been hoping that Lusti would have been back again soon, which is the nature of how one watched television back then. Now, of course, in this bingeing age, we all know everything at once. I kind of like it the other way, to be honest, which is why it might seem that we're not very knowledgeable. After all, we don't even tell how each episode ends, for people who might, in fact, be playing along at home.
DeleteThank you, Mitchell! The W. Hermanos Era is about to begin... and nothing will ever be the same. (As far as I know.)
ReplyDelete