WB Upfronts: Because You Like Hollywood's Pain
Television is just becoming increasingly fascinating, isn't it? In between intellectually stimulating fare like Blue Collar TV and Everwood, it's a wonder that The WB could squeeze in even more top-notch programming for its stunning upfront presentation. Thank you, Baby Jesus!
Because we can't afford to employ two dueling writers to live-blog this week's ritual ceremony of Hollywood selling itself, we've come to rely on reader reports of the TV industry's evil Manhattan invasion. (And evil it most certainly is. We like our local whoring just fine — we certainly need the studios' for a week.) After the jump, Sara Gilbert is reborn, Ashton Kutcher walks upright, and Melanie Griffith is a size queen.
I went to the WB upfront, which was just as painful. Clips from the new Liz "He's Just Not That Into You" Tuccillo show looked painful (though I did overhear an employee say that the show would "get better, since they're reshooting a ton of it because they fired Laura San Giacomo because she sucked and they're recasting").
Kohan and Mutchnick, the 2 guys who created "Will & Grace," did some standup about how they were going to "gay up" the WB by bringing a "hint of mint" to the network with their new sitcom "Twins" (David Janollari, Pres. of Entertainment at WB laughed nervously, since he had just finished talking about how the WB was taking the bold step of counter-programming their "Blue Collar Comedy Fagbash and Racebait Hour" against "Desp. Housewives.") Kohan made a joke about how they would change the WB schedule to contain the shows "Hung Like a Horse-ville" instead of "Smallville," and "Reba is Living with Fran." Then after the "Twins" presentation (the show actually looked pretty funny - Sarah Gilbert was hilarious), they trotted out the cast, including Melanie Griffith, looking like a CGI character. Mutchnick asked the cast if they wanted to say anything, and Melanie G. grabbed the mic and said "I would definitely watch "Hung-like-a-Horse-ville."
Ashton Kutcher came out to hawk his reality show "Beauty and the Geek," which looked an awful lot like "Average Joe."
I slipped in and out of consciousness through the rest of it, so I don't remember much else besides a handful of random clips: Some legal drama that had a scene involving a be-mulletted Don Johnson in a ludicrously choreographed fistfight, and a horror show called "Supernatural," which was working the whole "scary pale girl in a white robe walking all stuttery"-"Ring" thing.