BONNIE & CLYDE saved its most idiotic inspiration for the end.  Up until its last few minutes, the second half of the Lifetime/A&E/History miniseries was perhaps marginally better than its first (which we dealt with in yesterday’s review).  There was less chatty posthumous narration from Clyde (Emile Hirsch) this time around, a greater role […]

  Anne Hathaway has been one of the most versatile of recent SNL hosts, and in her third stint tonight, the show used her heavily, featuring her in everything but the cold open, Update and a brief pre-taped commercial parody.  The material, alas, wasn’t often up to her level, and in what’s been a heavily […]

  Not every novel needs to be a 4-hour miniseries, and a good example is A&E’s new version of COMA.  Robin Cook’s novel was capably filmed in 1978 by Michael Crichton in a brisk 113 minutes, and extending the story by more than an hour (once commercials are removed) does nothing but protract a tale […]

  THE WIZ LIVE was the smoothest, best-cast and best-sung yet of NBC’s annual Broadway musical pageants, although it had its own issues.  The network, and producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan, made a demographic choice in picking The Wiz as their latest production.  Although a Broadway hit, The Wiz isn’t generally considered part of […]

  It’s too easy to play the Hunger Games/”from hunger” card, so let’s just say that with one endearingly goofy exception, host Josh Hutcherson was barely even a presence on one of the weaker SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE episodes of the season.  His–and the show’s–one notable bit was a post-Update piece in which he (mostly) lip-synched […]

> Even diminished from the powerhouse it once was, GREY’S ANATOMY is the foundation of ABC’s drama schedule, and its return to the air after a nearly 2 month absence should lift the network’s Thursday considerably. WHERE WE LEFT OFF:  Things were grim when we last visited Seattle Grace.  Cristina (Sandra Oh) had, unknowingly, operated […]

  How do you launch 90 minute of live television comedy less than 36 hours after one of the most awful crimes in American history?  SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE tried to finesse the moment by starting its telecast tonight with a children’s choir singing “Silent Night,” but there was nevertheless some unavoidable awkwardness when the show […]

  Lorne Michaels has controlled the post-Tonight Show slot on NBC for more than 20 years (and with Jimmy Fallon’s ascension, he now has The Tonight Show in his portfolio as well), and for the third consecutive time, he’s pushed a Saturday Night Live veteran through that door with tonight’s debut of LATE NIGHT WITH […]