| January 11, 2005 |
MY CHRISTMAS TREE'S STILL UP BUT DROOPING
- . . . Meant to take it down this past weekend but didn't get to it. One year it was up 'til March.
- PLEASE TELL ME NO. Will Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos be the next Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey? Consuelos is on three episodes of wifey's Hope & Faith TV show and they were doing joint appearances on the talk shows last week to plug.
- Someone in an online chat described Ashlee Simpson, Jessica's sister, as "William Hung in a dress." That's pretty accurate.
- Bill Clinton's parting his hair now (on the right) instead of combing it straight back. Well, everybody wants to look younger.
- Mr. Big Stuff wondered whether the movie, Finding Neverland, was about Michael Jackson's ranch. (I think he oughta get out more often.)
- TSUNAMI OR TIDAL WAVE? Is there a difference or isn't there? Webster's defines them about the same, saying each is a "large ocean wave produced by a seaquake." So is this the final word?
- Foreign correspondent Sheila MacVicar is now with CBS News. She was most recently with CNN and before that ABC. I hope she's going where the money is.
- Amber Frey's face is as long as John Kerry's. Imagine their offspring.
- NO JOKE. They're building a treadmill for Maggie the elephant at the Alaska Zoo in Anchorage that'll cost $100,000. She needs more exercise. Story by Sarah Kershaw in Sunday's New York Times.
- So Sandra Bullock gave $1 million to tsunami relief. How does she have that much to give? She hasn't been in that many movies.
- Bow-tied Tucker Carlson's leaving CNN's Crossfire and Friday was his last show. He's on his way to MSNBC. They're going to develop a prime-time show for him. Yeah, we know what happens when they say they're gonna do that.
- IDOL RETURNING. On Tuesday, Jan. 18. This time around there'll be no guest judges but they used some (LL Cool J, Gene Simmons of Kiss, Brandy and Kenny Loggins) to help Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell whittle down some 103,000 auditions. Show producer Ken Warwick, in an interview with TV Guide, said another thing you won't see on this third edition of Idol is rap. So why did that have LL as a screener?
- Consumer Reports is now rating condoms. They submitted various brands to "vigorous testing" - however they do that - and Durex Extra Sensitive Lubricated Latex brand earned the #1 spot. A brand distributed by Planned Parenthood and colored melon was the worst, bursting in an air test. Hope somebody got fired for that.
- They say baby hippo Owen and Mzee, that 120-year-old tortoise, are inseparable over in Kenya. The hippo was swept away from its herd during the tsunami and has been snuggling up next to the giant tortoise ever since. Cute.
- BEYOND THE SEA. Kevin Spacey's vanity project interpretation of singer pop singer Bobby Darin's life. (Real name: Walden Robert Cassotto). The movie seems more like a vehicle for Spacey's singing and dancing than anything else. The singing's okay but the dancing is not: he's stiff and not limber. Some of the musical numbers work but the ensemble is better than him. His acting is not believable: yes, he is too old for the part and he doesn't fit the part (doesn't seem Italian). And those toupees. His hair looks painted on.
- . . . Beyond the Sea was a big hit for Darin in 1960 and was taken from a 1945 French song, La Mer.
- THE MAGIC OF PRE-TAPING. Colin Powell was on two Sunday talk shows at the same time last week: Fox News Sunday and This Week With George Stephanopoulos. Don't these characters know about the law of diminishing returns?
- THE MAGIC OF BEING CONNECTED. Former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski was on CBS's Face the Nation last Sunday and earlier in the morning his daughter, Mika, was on CBS's Sunday Morning and that night she did the CBS MarketWatch.update. Hmm.
- New York gossip columnist Liz Smith said that Desperate Housewives' Nicollette Sheridan's post-Knots Landing face looked "startingly exotic" and "a little transgendered-esque."
- NEW FEATURE: The Today show and Good Morning America have both started showing an on-screen menu board which lists what's coming up in the half-hour while the anchor reads it. I don't know if CBS's Early Show is doing it. All they ever do is have on Survivor or Amazing Race rejects. MSNBC goes a step further and uses time slugs next to the topics. That's a bit much.
- The children sang to Diane Sawyer in Thailand.
- CNN used ONLY ON CNN in the mid-to lower-third portion of the TV screen last week because, I think, of their tsunami coverage. They had a boatload of people over there. And Good Morning America used ONLY ON GMA for its story that Charlie Gibson did on conjoined twins and their separation. So I guess they were claiming their victories.
- The Munchkin-sounding Hamm twins (Paul and Morgan) were on ABC's 20/20 Friday night coaching/training two families who were part of the Obesity Olympics. Newly arrived Brit reporter Martin Bashir was correspondent on the story.
- CNN's Judy Woodruff has a new hairstyle. No more flip-outs at the ends a la Steve Cojocaru. (Cojo, as friends call him)
- Hanalie, dog in the neighborhood, was glad to see Gidget, the bare-eyed cockatoo, return home after being away for three weeks, and sat in front of her cage staring up at the bird for quite some time.
- Bring In Da Noise, Bring In Da Funk tap dancer Savion Glover is now tapping to classical music - Bach, Vivaldi, Bartok - in his show called Classical Savion. At the Joyce Theater in New York until Jan. 23.
- DEMEANING? ABC7's Gordon Peterson is seen in the driver's seat of a bus opening the door and saying, "I made the move, why don't you," referring to his move to Channel 7 from Channel 9. Anything for a promo.
- Washington's Metro is considering removing some seats from the trains in order to pack more people in. Seats closest to the doors. That'll make the experience even more of a cattle call.
- UH . . . Close the Door - Teddy Pendergrass on Philadelphia International, 1978. Former lead singer of R&B group Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes who went solo and was called Teddy Bear by his many rabid women fans.
