Vancouver TV Listings, Real Estate Listings, and Movie Listings - What's On

NIKITA GOES INTO ACTION

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:35:20 +0000

By now, television viewers and moviegoers know what the name Nikita stands for. Action. A whole lot of it. The franchise that made “La Femme Nikita” both a 1990 feature film and a 1997-2001 cable series (along with the 1993 movie Americanization, “Point of No Return”) yields its latest iteration as the fast-paced, stunt-packed CW show “Nikita” premieres Thursday, Sept. 9. Maggie Q (“Mission: Impossible III”) has the extremely physical title role of a government assassin who’s gone rogue from her agency, which turned out not to be what she thought it was.
Three years into her desertion, she’s still hunted by former colleagues who know she plans to destroy their operation unless they catch and eliminate her first. Shane West (“ER”) plays Michael, her chief pursuer, with Lyndsy Fonseca (“Desperate Housewives,” “How I Met Your Mother”) as a new agent who sees both sides of the situation and isn’t sure which way to go. Melinda Clarke (“The O.C.”) and Xander Berkeley (“24”) also are cast regulars.
“I don’t do anything but sleep when I’m not working,” ex-model Q says
of her regimen for the series. “I have no life. I’m no fun. All I want to do is sleep and get ready for the next day.”
And it isn’t that the actress isn’t braced for the schedule, thanks to her earlier work. “When I started in film, I was living and working in Asia,” she reports. “When we did films there, it was so fast, it was much like TV. They did films sometimes in two weeks, so I actually realize now that I’m very used to this pace. I kind of enjoy focusing, getting it out of the way and saying, ‘Let’s move on. Let’s do something cool again. Let’s get going.’”
That’s usually no problem, since “Nikita” was built for speed by its creative forces: executive producers McG (who directed the “Charlie’s Angels” movies) and Craig Silverstein (“Standoff”), and director Danny Cannon, who helped develop the “CSI” style by calling the shots on the parent show’s pilot and many episodes of all three of CBS’ “CSI” series.
“My first thought was that I love ‘Nikita,’ ” Silverstein says of approaching the concept anew. “My second thought was, ‘It’s been done.’ Could it be done fresh? Could we have a take where you didn’t know how this story was going to end? “That’s when I came upon the idea of following Nikita after she had left the agency – which is a story that’s never been told – and at the same time doing justice to the origin of Nikita, that dark fairy tale of taking a girl, changing her identity and transforming her into a killer.”
Such a transformation happens now with Alex, the Fonseca character whom the experienced, vengeful Nikita hopes to steer away from the agency. “I think we’re all very excited about the notion of empowered female characters,” McG reasons. “From my experience with ‘Charlie’s Angels’ on down, I like the idea of characters that don’t apologize for being beautiful but are very intelligent and multidimensional. I think Maggie nails that.”
Director Cannon agrees, especially since his star is delivering what he needs visually to give “Nikita” credibility. “I’ll be honest; I don’t watch television,” he reveals. “I got hired by Jerry Bruckheimer to do the ‘CSI’ pilot because he wasn’t going to give me the movie I was asking for. I went out to impress him, and that’s all I do now. I’ll make small minimovies as quick as I can, without lowering any expectations. I’ll just keep ramming my head against the wall until it looks as good as I think it should.”
Another “Nikita” player often in danger of having his head meet a wall is co-star West, who stays on the move as the person charged with Nikita’s capture. He says he is “a fan of the original film” and has worked with Peta Wilson, the previous television Nikita, but he “really didn’t want to do too much research on the past characters because I wanted to give it a fresh take. It’s also a different age.”
Ultimately, whether “Nikita” works depends on whether title star Q works in it. She maintains she’s happy with what it is demanding of her, day in and day out. “I’ve gotten to that point where I’m so used to being sort of sweaty and sitting like a guy in boots, when I’m dressed up and people are touching me up, I’m less comfortable. I like to wear less makeup and be tougher.”
“Nikita” all but guarantees that for Q, who says making the show often prompts her to remember her roots as a performer. “When I got to America, they said, ‘You’re going to work 12-hour days.’ I almost fainted. I’d never worked a 12-hour day … I’d worked 16- to 18-hour days. You certainly weren’t spoiled; we didn’t even have trailers. I had a plastic stool, and we’d sit on the street and eat out of lunchboxes. I’ve been here five years, and it still blows my mind that I have somewhere to go back to when I’m not filming.”

JOBRO’S & DEMI

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:32:01 +0000

Kids who go to sleep-away camp look forward all school year to friends they see only in summer, not showering all that often and freedom. Parents love camp, too, but for different reasons. The camp themes of good versus evil and fake versus genuine play out in Disney’s “Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam” Friday, Sept. 3 on Family.
The sequel to “Camp Rock,” a huge hit two years ago, reunites the Jonas Brothers as the band Connect 3, with Demi Lovato as Mitchie. There are fledgling, chaste romances and the lesson that leadership requires cooperation and hard work. The plot pitches talented teens against other talented teens, culminating in a singing and dancing competition with high stakes. An interesting aside is that the audience watching the competition at the end of the movie is made up of real fans. They were found when the Jonas Brothers and Lovato Twittered for extras. Within three minutes, 60,000 had applied for 1,500 slots, says a publicist, and by that night the traffic had reached 1 million, crashing the server. Lovato (“Sonny With a Chance”),
whom the channel has been grooming for stardom, is aggressively earnest as she sings and dances.
Though there’s plenty for JoBro fans to enjoy, this is Lovato’s movie. “This was the first film I was not totally overshadowed by them,” Lovato says from a Manhattan hotel room. “Going into the film, I knew this time would be different. I couldn’t get away with not doing my best performance.”
The movie is better than it needs to be, considering it has a built-in audience. Lovato, who has been touring with the Jonas Brothers, was thrust into the frenzy swirling around the brothers. “Their fans are supportive, and they are supportive of me,” she says. “It’s crazy to arrive at 4am with fans waiting inside the hotel.”
On a rainy day in New York, the brothers are sequestered in a hotel. Gigantic bodyguards, placed every so many yards in the hotel hallways, keep watch for overzealous fans. The brothers, who get along easily with one another, laugh as they recall their camp days. Camp, says Kevin Jonas, is
“amazing. You never want to lose your love of camp.” He attended camp for nine years, Joe for seven and Nick for four. They all say they loved it, and Joe’s favorite memory is “the last day of camp, there was a giant relay race.”
Kevin recalls boys daring one another. “You’d eat an entire onion by yourself,” he says. Joe adds, “Or you would eat a whole piece of Spam.”
“Camp is so universal,” Kevin says. “It buys that sense of togetherness. You have camp friends that you only see at camp and couldn’t see an entire year.”
Camp Rock is for kids who want to be rock stars. A rival rock-wannabe camp, Camp Star, sets up business across the lake and threatens Camp Rock’s existence. “At Camp Rock, everyone has grown up a little more,” Kevin says. “Joe and Nick and I are in it more, and we take on a leadership role, the ownership of the camp — we feel a responsibility. You feel part of the journey — wanting the camp to survive.”
The camp owner is on the brink of closing Camp Rock as counselors and kids defect to Camp Star, but Mitchie rallies the troops to save the sweet, no-frills camp they love. “The fact that it’s tons of different stories and has a moral to it,” is her takeaway, Lovato says. “And being the right kind of leader. She becomes very bossy. I remember girls can be super bossy. Girls can learn from that.”
Sure, the kids break into song and dance at any given moment. And it’s about as realistic as these situations are in any musical. But remember, Disney ushered in the model for movie musicals for kids with “High School Musical.” The choreography is devoid of sexuality, and to understand what an accomplishment that is, tune into most music videos and see how comfortable parents are allowing tweens to watch.
“Dancing is something I have always been passionate about,” Lovato says. “I started with jazz, tap and ballet, at 10, then took hip-hop.”
She can also belt a number, evident as Mitchie leads everyone in “Brand New Day.” There’s something here for parents who know their album covers. The brothers pose briefly as musicians from iconic LPs. There are nods to such cover art as Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” and Crosby, Stills & Nash’s first album. One of the best songs is Nate (Nick Jonas) singing, “Introducing Me” with the lyrics of: “I eat cheese only on pizza, except in a homemade quesadilla, otherwise it smells like cheese … .”
Sure, the movie’s title includes the word “final,” but the ending, which will not be revealed here, leaves open the possibility of sequels.

CAT IN THE HAT’S BACK – WITH SCIENCE FACTS

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:28:56 +0000

The Cat in the Hat’s back – with some neat science facts.
The sun did not shine.
It was too wet to play.
So we sat in the house
All that cold, cold, wet day.
Those lyrical four sentences sparked a revolution. Dr. Seuss’ start to the classic “The Cat in the Hat” created generations of readers. Before Theodor Geisel enchanted us with loopy drawings and improbable situations that slyly taught phonics, kids learned to read in spite of the coma-inducing Dick and Jane books. Now Geisel’s estate and PBS hope to set off a similar revolution by interesting children in science with “Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That!” premiering Monday, Sept. 6 (check local listings).
The weekday show updates the story, which was originally published in 1957. Rather than have the Cat burst in while the mother is out and wreak havoc in the house of a white brother and sister, the story now has Sally and Nick, a white girl and a black boy who are now neighbors, ask their respective moms if they can go on adventures with the Cat. The Cat remains delightfully zany, and that’s because Martin Short lends his voice.
Like most parents, Short had read the books to his three children and provided voices. He reflects on how he found the Cat’s voice for the show. “When I was a kid watching the Marx Brothers, everyone was obsessed with Groucho, but I was obsessed with Harpo,” Short says in a rare interview. “He jumped, he leaped, he pulled things out.”
Of course Harpo was also silent, but Short explains it was more the essence of Harpo that he seeks. “It was his energy, his combustibility,” he says.
He also weaves in some of the Mad Hatter, which seems quite appropriate given the Cat’s personality. “Voice work is always fun,” Short says. “I am someone who, if I had my druthers, I would do 150 takes of what I do. You can spend a whole day in the studio just trying on different voices and generally I like to,” he says. “I am a big collaborative worker, and you do something like this, and you want everyone on the exact same page. You can spend all day doing nine voices, and I’ll say, ‘Let’s all sleep on it and meet again, and you tell me what you like.’ ” In the pilot, Short as the Cat says, “Don’t you just love gurgling? I do!”
Really, who doesn’t? The first cartoon has Nick run out of honey at breakfast, and the Cat, Sally and Nick – aided by Thing 1 and Thing 2 – seek the source of honey. They must be shrunk and their clothes painted to look like bees before they’re presented to the queen, who bares a Seussian resemblance to Queen Elizabeth. They learn about flowers, nectar, dancing, mixing and spitting honey.
Cartoon interstitials ask what makes a bird a bird and what red-eyed frogs eat (feathers and insects, respectively). The second cartoon has the Thinga-ma-jigger (the Cat’s magical vehicle) follow Melvin, a purple martin who has disappeared from the backyard. The kids learn about migration initially from some uppity birds, again perfectly in keeping with Seuss (remember the nasty bird who leaves Horton with her egg?) and totally silly.
And that’s why this show is so great. Kids are bound to learn, but in the most benign way.
“Its concept is very good,” Short says. “Two kids, and this imaginary friend shows up. Or is he imaginary? He is kind of what we are talking about – relying on imagination and adventure that the kids create for themselves. They are learning things they are experiencing through their imagination.”

A NEW LOOK AT OLD LEGENDS

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:21:23 +0000

“Sanguinarian” is a word that doesn’t come up much in everyday conversation. But when you set out to make a documentary about real-life vampires, you turn up people with some unusual dietary habits, says Peter Gentile, one of the producers of “The Real,” which airs Tuesdays on History Television. A sanguinarian is someone who believes he or she needs regular feedings of blood to maintain good health and energy levels. And when Gentile was looking for modern Draculas, he found one in Chicago – with a generous girlfriend who keeps him in the red stuff.
“We actually found two real vampires, and we brought them up from the States,” Gentile says. “One is a psychic vampire, and the other is a sanguinarian, who feeds on other people’s blood. I don’t think this is going to catch on in the ’burbs, but he brought his girlfriend up from Chicago, and he actually cuts her – on-screen – and drinks her blood.”
The show contains interviews with author Anne Rice and various academics and a segment on a photographer who is putting together a “reinvention of ‘The Last Supper’ with vampires.”
The highlight, for want of a better term, has to be the sanguinarian, though. Gentile says his researchers had uncovered stories about real-life vampires but had to spend a lot of time looking for “the real deal” and finding one who was willing to play Gulping Gourmet on TV.
Meanwhile, the psychic vampire is someone who “feeds off people’s energy” through “touch and sense” and claims to be able to draw nourishment from people’s “auras. You may dispute this,” Gentile says. “Our thing was that vampires are a myth, but do they actually exist, and where does it come from? So we look at it that way. But there are people who actually live a vampiric life.”
“The Real” takes familiar stories and gives them a new spin. Other segments in the series look at “The Real Pirates of the Caribbean” and “The Real M*A*S*H” – wartime surgery and emergency care. “It’s an anthology series, and they’re going to be taking these famous people or myths, or things we think we know about, and trying to find what was really behind these things,” Gentile says.
The show debuted with a look at Jack the Ripper, which was also produced by Gentile. It retold the familiar tale of the Victorian-era serial killer by focusing on the victims, with footage of a descendant of one of the victims touring London’s Whitechapel, where the murders took place. Gentile says his first reaction was to wonder how such a tired story could possibly be freshened up.
“I think there were something like 27 docs done on it,” he says “so trying to find something new was difficult. But we found this one gentleman who wrote a book on the lives of the women who were the victims.”
In the cases of both shows he produced, Gentile says, the crew found the story as it went along, blending documentary with dramatic re-creations to bring it to life. “You’re discovering stuff all the time and coming up with a story,” he says. “You can call it drama or documentary, but to me it doesn’t really matter. It’s television. It’s got to be engaging.

RENNIE GETS ‘SHATTERED’

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:17:56 +0000

In “Shattered,” Callum Keith Rennie is four of the most interesting people you’d ever want to meet. That, he says, is what lured him into taking on the job of heroic lead after a career spent enjoying the artistic freedom and security of character roles. The series, which recently debuted its Wednesday time slot on Global, revolves around a detective with a grim secret: He has dissociative identity disorder. In other words, his head houses at least four distinct personalities. Some of these personalities are unaware of the others, and some are hostile to the others. At least one, the main character of Ben Sullivan, is trying hard to be a good cop while he keeps the others under control – particularly Sam, a bad cop with a taste for pot, booze and breaking the rules. “It was a lot of fun, in the sense of not getting locked into one role all the time,” Rennie says. “There were these breaks: Oh, now you’re a hammerhead who’s smoking and doing all sorts of mayhem. Here, you’re a guy who’s so aggressive that he’s completely different from Ben Sullivan. And here’s this other element who’s a lot younger and doesn’t deal with the world in any of those ways. But how do you create a show where the lead character has the least personality?”
The answer, Rennie says, was to create a “tortured individual, but not to the point of being a victim. I tried to make him into a cop, and then this other stuff happens. He’s a good man, and this other stuff happens. He’s a good husband, but this other stuff happens.”
“This other stuff,” is the emergence of long-submerged personalities that have surfaced in the wake of the kidnapping of his son – a season-long story arc that is constantly percolating in the background. The only one aware of Ben’s condition is his wife (Molly Parker); colleagues – including his partner (Camille Sullivan), his ex-partner and best friend (Martin Cummins), and an ambitious young co-worker (Cle Bennett) mostly write off his personality shifts as stress, mood swings or a tortured, brilliant mind. Meanwhile, Ben has to referee four alternate personalities, who “each serve a specific role in his mind, and how he works out in the world.”
They range from a rambunctious teenager to the aforementioned Sam, a menacing character who surfaces in times of tension on the job – leaving Ben’s partner not sure whether she’s working with a hero or a lunatic. Part of the research Rennie did for the role involved hanging out at websites for people with DID. The effects of the condition, he discovered, range from the kind of extreme transformations we see in “United States of Tara” to conditions that are much more subtle, where no one but the person with the disorder is aware of what is going on. At one point, Rennie says, he even began to wonder if he might not have the condition. “You go, ‘That’s read about it, I began to totally relate to it. You totally relate to moments where you just trip out. One of the best descriptions I read was that it’s like when you’re driving, and all of a sudden, 15 miles have gone by, and you went somewhere. You just checked out, and you don’t know exactly where that was.”
Rennie is mainly known as a character actor – a self-described sidekick – who plays outsiders, characters who are little bit off-kilter and scene-stealing bad guys such as Zero in “Tin Man.”
He also has played his share of good guys, such as the slovenly Chicago cop opposite Paul Gross’ clean-cut Mountie on “Due South” and the guitar god Billy Tallent (for whom the rock band was named) in “Hard Core Logo.”
He describes that career trajectory as a safe one, and one that offered a steady diet of variety. “For an actor who has been playing supporting roles, and playing the weirdos and the bad people, to make that transition was challenging for Callum,” says “Shattered” executive producer Hugh Beard. “I know he had some apprehension about being the lead, and about the responsibility – because being a lead actor in a series, you really do set the standard for everybody. You set the tone. And his work has been fantastic.”
Rennie says he was drawn to the role of series lead – and the job of producer for the first time – by the fact that Ben contains this range of characters. “It allows a lot of freedom, where I wouldn’t play the same thing all the time. It meant trying to find the world of this person within the framework of a procedural cop show, and do that stuff. And then there’s this very heavy, weird, background of this character’s life. I thought that it would give it a lot more color and a lot more range. I thought it would be a very full world.”

BILL SHATNER’S WEIRD, WEIRD WORLD

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:40:06 +0000

It’s not as if William Shatner was sitting around the house waiting for the phone to ring. The 79-year-old Montreal native left the image of James T. Kirk behind years ago — largely thanks to his Emmy-winning turn in “Boston Legal.” But lately, he seems determined to bury his past under a pile of work that could hobble a man half his age. As well as starring in the upcoming CBS sitcom “$..! My Dad Says” (CTV hasn’t figured out when or if it will premiere My Dad a few weeks after CBS’s initial run, or if another temporary spot will be found for it while the remaining So You Think You Can Dance Canada results episodes air.), he produces and writes documentaries for his own production company, runs a computer effects firm, and operates a horse-raising operation with his fourth wife.
And he’s the host and a producer of “William Shatner’s Weird or What?” debuting Wednesday, Sept. 1, on History Television. “Shows like ‘Weird or What?’ keep me busy, and I like it that way,” he says. “I’ve just come from Lexington, Ky., where I was competing in a horse show. … I just shot an episode of “American Pickers” (about junk collectors, Tuesdays on History Television). … I was in London, Toronto, New York, Princeton … .”
As “Weird or What?” producer Charles Tremayne says, “The neat thing about Bill is that he’s evolved as he’s got older. “His greatest work is ‘Boston Legal.’ Captain Kirk is long forgotten, and he’s looking to the next stage of his career. He never stops.”
“Weird or What?” is a weekly documentary series in which Shatner, in a whimsical, slightly over-the-top style, leads the audience through such unexplained and slightly creepy phenomena as giant ice balls falling from the sky and sneakers with feet in them washing up on beaches. “I think the great thing is, you could end up doing a very dry scientific analysis of some of these stories,” Tremayne says of Shatner’s theatrical hosting style. “And what Bill has done over the years is reinvent himself as this new iconic character who purposely takes the mickey out of himself.
“He’s almost playing an intriguing, semisatirical role, which really works for him, and people really get what he’s trying to say. “When we told him it was to be called ‘William Shatner’s Weird or What?’ he said, ‘I love that; they’ll think I’m weird.’ ”
Each episode is separated into three segments, each exploring a mystery, for a total, over the 10 episodes, of 30 mysteries that “meet the test of incredulity,” Shatner says.
In each segment, there are at least two theories that are put to the test, allowing the producers to delve into a variety of sciences and devise some ingenious experiments, Tremayne says. “It’s basically trying to explain the unexplainable, I suppose. And if we don’t explain it, it doesn’t matter, because we’ve tested it as far as it can go.”
For example, one story literally fell into Tremayne’s lap, in the form of a picture in London’s Daily Mail newspaper showing rocks that appear to miraculously creep across the floor of Death Valley. “Nobody could explain what was causing it,” he says. “I put it in the hands of the producers, and by the end, we’d done a big experiment that showed how these stones could move in the middle of the winter, when the mud flats turn into solid ice. We did an experiment that showed that wind itself could drive the stones across the land.”
Shatner compares the process to a murder mystery, in which “the intrigue of the explanation” is the point. “I don’t think there are any limits,” he says. “Everything that takes place is weird, whether it’s a social transaction or a physical event. Everything we perceive is, in its final analysis, kind of weird, because there are ramifications that we barely know. “Quantum physics tells us that everything we’re looking at may not, in fact, be there. So the underlying nature of being is weird. And if you can find an explanation for an event, and you’re content with the explanation, one knows that underneath that explanation is another explanation that we can’t even conceive of yet.”
Shatner has a long relationship with science and the strange, from his years with the “Star Trek” series and movies and his “Tek War” science-fiction novels to his participation in such projects as “How William Shatner Changed the World,” a 2005 documentary that looked at how “Trek” anticipated technological breakthroughs. Even at the end of his eighth decade, he says, he still hasn’t lost his “sense of amazement” with the world. “I’m filled with amazement at everything. If you can keep that sense of wonder, that childlike bewilderment. … I love explaining to my grandchildren, who come to me and ask, ‘How does this work?’ Their 4-year-old’s wonder at the world is something that we should never lose.”

THE EMMYS

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:30:36 +0000

A mix of fresh newcomers, reliable veterans and several now-ended TV shows will compete for this year’s Primetime Emmy Awards, with wartime miniseries The Pacific, high school comedy Glee and period drama Mad Men leading the way.
The Pacific, the gritty, 10-part Second World War series from the creators of the previously acclaimed Band of Brothers, earned a leading 24 Emmy nods on Thursday, including as one of only two best miniseries contenders. (The other is the star-studded 19th century British drama Return to Cranford.)
Hit high school musical comedy Glee, a blockbuster success and pop culture already in its first season, followed with 19 nominations. It will vie for the outstanding comedy series title, with competition from Curb Your Enthusiasm, Modern Family, Nurse Jackie, The Office and 30 Rock. Lea Michele and Chris Colfer are among Glee actors nominated for Emmy Awards for their roles in the high school musical comedy. Glee’s ensemble also picked up acting nods, including Matthew Morrison (lead actor, comedy),
Lea Michele (lead actress, comedy), Chris Colfer (supporting actor, comedy), Jane Lynch (supporting actress, comedy), Mike O’Malley (guest actor, comedy), Neil Patrick Harris (guest actor, comedy) and Kristin Chenoweth (guest actress, comedy).
Other new shows recognized with first time Emmy noms include the extended family sitcom Modern Family, a breakout success that will vie for best comedy and see five of its cast members compete for acting trophies, as well as best drama finalist The Good Wife.
The legal drama, starring TV veteran Julianna Margulies, earned a raft of nods for writing and acting, including for Margulies, supporting players Christine Baranski and Archie Panjabi, and guest turns by Alan Cumming and Dylan Baker.
The uber-stylish, 1960s-set Mad Men, which follows the key players of a Manhattan ad agency, is the dramatic leader with 17 nominations.
Mad Men actors Jon Hamm, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, John Slattery and Elisabeth Moss are all up for Emmys. The show will make a bid for its third consecutive outstanding drama series Emmy. It faces strong competition for the trophy from Breaking Bad, Dexter, The Good Wife, Lost and True Blood.
A long list of Mad Men’s actors picked up nominations, including Jon Hamm (lead actor, drama), January Jones (lead actress, drama), John Slattery (supporting actor, drama), Christina Hendricks (supporting actress, drama), Elisabeth Moss (supporting actress, drama) and Robert Morse (guest actor, drama).
Emmy voters also showed their appreciation to a number of now-ended shows, including the island drama Lost (12 nominations), counter-terrorism thriller 24 (5), divorcee sitcom The New Adventures of Old Christine (2) and crime-solving comedy Monk (2).
SELECTED NOMINEES
Lead actor, comedy: Larry David, Curb Your Enthusiasm; Steve Carell, The Office; Jim Parsons, The Big Bang Theory; Tony Shalhoub, Monk; Matthew Morrison, Glee; Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock.
LEAD ACTRESS, COMEDY: Lea Michele, Glee; Julia Louis-Dreyfus, The New Adventures of Old Christine; Edie Falco, Nurse Jackie; Amy Poehler, Parks and Recreation; Tina Fey, 30 Rock; Toni Collette, United States of Tara.
LEAD ACTOR,DRAMA: Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad; Michael C. Hall, Dexter; Kyle Chandler, Friday Night Lights; Hugh Laurie, House; Matthew Fox, Lost; Jon Hamm, Mad Men.
LEAD ACTRESS, DRAMA: Kyra Sedgewick, The Closer; Glenn Close, Damages; Connie Britton, Friday Night Lights; Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife; Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU; January Jones, Mad Men.
REALITY COMPETITION: Amazing Race; American Idol; Dancing with the Stars; Project Runway; Top Chef.
VARIETY, MUSIC OR COMEDY SERIES:The Colbert Report; The Daily Show with Jon Stewart; Real time with Bill Maher; Saturday Night Live; The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien.
CANADIAN NOMINEES:
Actor Martin Short, for a dramatic turn as a scheming lawyer on the series Damages. Actress Catherine O’Hara, who appeared in the miniseries Temple Grandin.
Actor Dave Foley, who voiced the lead role in the Disney animated TV special Prep & Landing.
Director Jeremy Podeswa, for his work on the Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks-produced miniseries The Pacific.

Conan O’Brien was also recognized with four nominations (including for outstanding variety, music or comedy series) for his short stint hosting The Tonight Show.
Jay Leno, who returned to the post after failing at an earlier evening talk show, was snubbed — as was David Letterman, who faced an attempted extortion plot by a former CBS producer and admitted on-air to infidelities with female employees over the years.
Betty White’s highly touted turn hosting Saturday Night Live earned the venerable TV star a nod for guest actress in a comedy series. It was also among the dozen Emmy nominations picked up by the long running, New York-based sketch comedy series bringing the show’s overall tally of Emmy nominations to 126 and surpassing medical drama ER ’s previous record of 124. For a complete list of nominations go to: http://www.emmys.com/nominations

WHAT A LOAD OF OLD GARBAGE

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:25:26 +0000

This is one time you can tell a producer his show stinks and have it taken as a compliment.
In “Trashopolis” — premiering Thursday, Sept. 2, on History Television — the story of a city is written in its garbage. The five-parter looks at London, New York, Paris, Rome and Cairo and finds that much of these cities’ present was dictated by long-forgotten issues related to living with and getting rid of garbage. “There’s always the appeal of learning something new about the history of a city you know,” says series producer Nicola Merola, explaining why four of the cities seem like such typical choices. “New York, Rome, even if you haven’t been there, you’ve seen movies. Everybody knows them a little bit. They’re kind of fetish cities. “The other reason is that each had some natural story line with trash.”
For example, London’s sewage and trash disposal systems, which were created in the 19th century, are the result of waves of cholera epidemics caused by the state of the Thames, which was an open sewer. “People were dying,” Merola says. “In those days, in so many cities all over the world, when the poor die, you don’t care. But when the rich start to die, then you start to care. So when the rich started to die of sickness, the government decided to fund the building of the sewers.” The story is much the same in Paris, where the king demanded decent waste removal after having a chamber pot dumped on his head. Rome, Merola says, was “a constant battle between beauty and trash,” dating back two millennia, to when Rome was already a city of a million inhabitants — many of whom would socialize in the public toilets. So 1,800 years before the world would see another city that size, Rome pioneered waste removal. “New York was all about the money,” Merola says. “If you can make a penny in New York, someone will make it. And very early on in New York, some guys realized there was a lot of money in trash.”
The episode that stands out, Merola says, is Cairo, “because we wanted something very different.” Until recently, garbage was picked up by the Zabbaleen, Christians who sorted recyclables and fed organic materials to pigs — with which Muslims are forbidden contact. “What the Zabbaleen do is go up the stairs to the apartments of the rich people and collect the trash. Then they sort it out, give the food to their pigs, and the rest they recycle,” Merola says. The result is “lots of little industries” that depended on garbage.
In addition to raising pigs, which produce meat and fertilizer, the Zabbaleen made money by recycling plastics and metals. The result was that 80 percent of the trash of the rich people in Cairo was being reused or recycled. Making “Trashopolis” wasn’t what most of us would call a glamour job, Merola says. Producers and crews had to climb over piles of garbage, wade through sewers and watch trash-disposal workers do their jobs. One hurdle was that trash companies usually don’t like publicity. “They’re afraid that you’re going to talk about the bad stuff they’re doing,” Merola says. “But this series is a history show. “We’re looking at the good stuff humankind did to get rid of the trash over the centuries.” “Trashopolis” premieres Thursday on History Television.

JIMMY FALLON DONS PRIMETIME MANTLE

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:22:25 +0000

Emmy host Jimmy Fallon is about to get his biggest single audience yet, and he has Emmy to thank for it. The “Saturday Night Live” alum and current host of NBC’s weeknight “Late Night With Jimmy Fallon” gets an earlier showcase by presiding over the NBC telecast of the 62nd Primetime Emmy Awards from Los Angeles’ Nokia Theatre on Sunday, Aug. 29. It’s a big deal for Fallon, who clearly likes to be liked; not only will he be seen by many people usually not up late enough to catch his own show, but he’s an avowed television fan. “I don’t want to push too hard,” Fallon says of the one-liners he’ll deliver on Emmy night. “I want the Academy (of Television Arts and Sciences, which decides who wins) to be happy, I want (Emmy show executive producer) Don Mischer to be happy, and I want NBC to be happy. It’s not really about me. It’s more about celebrating television and getting all of those (winners) face time.”
Fallon certainly is going into his Emmy gig well-armed with material. “We gave them, I think, six or seven scripts,” he says. “They were like, ‘OK, stop it! That’s more than enough. We have to give out awards at some point.’ I think that coming from ‘Saturday Night Live,’ we kind of know how far you can push things, and what’s enjoyable. I don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable. I want to make people laugh. We do throw away jokes sometimes if they’re a little bit too mean,” Fallon adds, “but they’re funny, and I get the laugh just in the office. When I ‘hit’ people, I do it in the nicest way, because I don’t dislike anybody. I love everybody and the whole business that we’re in, so (I just make) a little playful jab here and there.”
The HBO miniseries “The Pacific,” with Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks among its producers, leads this year’s Emmy nominations with a total of 24. The most-nominated regularly scheduled series is Fox’s freshman year comedy “Glee” with 19 bids, including separate ones for stars Lea Michele, Matthew Morrison, Chris Colfer and Jane Lynch.
“It’s been a crazy-good year for TV,” Fallon reflects. “I mean, with new shows like ‘Modern Family’ and ‘Glee,’ and old shows going away, like ‘Law & Order’ and ‘24’ and ‘Lost’? I’m still trying to figure out what happened on ‘Lost.’ I don’t even know. Were they dead the whole time?”
“Late Night With Jimmy Fallon” is up for two Emmy Awards itself: outstanding short-form picture editing, plus the honor it won last year, outstanding creative achievement in interactive media, nonfiction, for the show’s related “Jimmy Fallon Experience” online. Another nominee from that part of the NBC broadcast day is “The Tonight Show,” which has among its four bids outstanding variety, music or comedy series for its now finished Conan O’Brien iteration — while past and present “Tonight” overseer Jay Leno’s version scored no nominations.
Fallon recalls that during those two hosts’ much-reported negotiating, “I just kind of kept my head down and kept working hard, just looking for the next joke. I wasn’t really in the mix of all that. I just stuck to my thing. Everyone else was doing (jokes about it), and I couldn’t think of any angle except to say, ‘The one thing I’ve learned from those guys is that hosting “Late Night” is the one-way ticket to not hosting “The Tonight Show.” ’ ” An already known highlight of this year’s Emmy ceremony will be George Clooney’s receipt of the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award, being given for the first time in six years. Otherwise, the Television Academy is trying to keep surprises under wraps, but expect Fallon to inject himself into parodies of popular shows. He reveals he recently did some filming with Christina Hendricks of AMC’s “Mad Men.” “It should be fun,” Fallon says. “I think we’re going to do some musical stuff. I don’t want to give away what we’re doing, because surprise is just a funny emotion to experience. And you don’t really get to do it that much.”
A very important part of Fallon’s Emmy job will be to bring the show in exactly at three hours. In a rare move, NBC will air the event twice on the West Coast: live at 5 p.m. Pacific time, when the East Coast also is getting it live at 8 p.m., then again on tape delay immediately afterward. “I don’t worry at all,” Fallon maintains about hitting that three hour mark precisely. “I just let (the Emmy producers) worry about that. As a fan of the Emmys and a fan of award shows in general, I just want them to move along. I want to keep this fast and tight, so we’re all with the same goal in mind. Even the people in the crowd are like, ‘OK, let’s get this over with!’ I want to keep it fresh and fun … and respectful, too.”

URBAN DEVELOPMENT

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:18:34 +0000

Keith Urban is married to an Oscar-winning actress, but he knows he has another important relationship to maintain: the one with his fans. Still at the forefront of country music stars, Nicole Kidman’s spouse gets a big opportunity to please his followers each June, when artists and listeners converge on Nashville for a Country Music Association-sponsored event. The four-day gathering is captured for a television special, and ABC airs this year’s edition of “CMA Music Festival: Country’s Night to Rock” Wednesday, Sept. 1. A preview disc indicated the three-hour show offers a generous dose of the New Zealand-born and Australia-raised Urban, whose virtual greatest-hits set includes “Kiss a Girl” and “Days Go By.” Among the many other talents showcased: Carrie Underwood, Brad Paisley, Tim McGraw, Rascal Flatts, Lady Antebellum, Martina McBride, Alan Jackson, Reba McEntire, Trace Adkins, and engaged couple Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton. Though he’s had a busy summer concert schedule, as have so many of his country music peers, Urban recognizes that playing the CMA Music Festival is still a prime gig.
Q: Did you enjoy performing at this year’s festival as much as it appears?
A: Yeah, I really did. There’s something about that crowd, and probably that little bit of extra mojo about performing in that stadium — not long after it was under water (from the flooding in Nashville) — was a euphoric feeling as well.
Q: Have you intentionally stocked your catalog with tunes that practically invite the audience to sing along?
A: I hoped that one day, I would have a set list where people know the majority of the songs. It’s a blast to look out there and see people singing along with every song; it’s incredible. I’m always happy to let my voice take a break and let the audience carry it!
Q: How have you personally experienced the growth of the festival, which used to be known as Fan Fair, over the years?
A: It’s astounding to see how big it’s gotten, particularly this year. I couldn’t see an empty seat anywhere. It’s such a win-win; what a magnificent thing that this festival is based on the genre and not on the specific artists. So many people come to celebrate their love of country music, and within three or four days, you’ve seen everybody.
Q: You made a point of saying in the show, “Nashville is alive and well and open for business.” How are you fi nding it there now?
A: Certainly, it takes a little while, and it’s been difficult with Opryland out of commission. I think people know we’re back up and running, though, and Tennessee isn’t called the Volunteer State for nothing. Everybody pulled together, and here we are.
Q: Is being the father of Sunday, your two-year-old daughter with Nicole, having an impact on your music?
A: Yeah, for sure. I’m not out there working all the time, and from being home, it’s important to have something to take out onstage. I think everything benefits from it. I think the performances have more purpose for me. If we’re going to go out and connect with everybody, what are we communicating?
I have enormous gratitude for having found somebody and found my center … then to be able to plug into that through my music, if I can.