'The West Wing' Takes on the Politics of the Debt Ceiling Vote

The Washington Post dug up this clip from The West Wing's sixth season where White House advisor Toby Ziegler explained what the debt ceiling is and the politics of the congressional manuevering on the matter. MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell, who used to consult and write for the NBC drama, was a writer on this episode entitled, "In God We Trust."

Watching the clip reminds me of how much I miss The West Wing because it contained two of my favorite elements: It was smart and it was centered around politics. The Good Wife is the closest currently airing show that comes close to providing an insightful glimpse into the world of modern politics, Chicago style.

If only all of our civics lessons could be taught by the West Wing folks . . .

Fans Campaign to Save TNT’s ‘Men of a Certain Age’

I was among the fans of TNT’s subtle yet affecting drama Men of a Certain Age. I found it to be a soulful, smart meditation on the lives of three, middle-aged, down-to-earth guys who were neither cops nor brilliant surgeons. Their significant others weren’t supermodels or celebrities. They themselves were ordinary looking dudes with ordinary jobs who seemed mystified that they could already have arrived at middle age when inside, they still feel like young, clueless kids.

That’s what made TNT’s decision to pull the plug on the drama – for which Andre Braugher has been justly nominated for an Emmy – disappointing. There aren’t many shows like Men of a Certain Age on TV, the low-keyed ones, the quiet ones that stay with you that don’t throw in other, extraneous dramatic elements to artificially jazz up the action.

And while I hope that the folks who are currently campaigning to Save Men of a Certain Age (there’s a Facebook page and a petition, as well as a blog entry with e-mail addresses to which to send pleas find some success elsewhere, perhaps like NBC's Friday Night Lights did when it was saved by DirecTV) I’m not that optimistic. I don’t think that even compulsive gambler Joe would like the odds.

Entertainment journalist Jon Weisman wrote in Variety that he thinks the campaign is almost certainly doomed. "Watching a movement to save a canceled TV show is a little like watching a squirrel fighting for its life after being hit by a truck," he wrote. "No matter how much you're rooting for that squirrel, it's more than a little painful to witness."

"The new squirrel on the highway is Men of a Certain Age, which was canceled by TNT," Weisman continued. " . . . The 'Save Men of a Certain Age' Facebook page is off to the rescue, complimented by more save-the-show e-mails to me (and therefore, I assume, to many others) than I've seen perhaps in my entire time working at Variety."

Here’s to hoping that the squirrel recovers and comes out of this a winner.

Image credit: Save Men of a Certain Age.

Trailer Time: 'The Help' and 'The Ides of March'

Last year I slugged my way through The Help, the novel that seemed to be on every book club’s required reading list. It wasn’t as grab-me-by-the-lapels-and-make-me-read-it as I'd hoped it would be, at least not until the very end when I wound up staying up until the wee hours of the morning to finish it.

Yes, the fact that it's main character is an upstart writer was intriguing to me (as I'm a writer myself), but the book seemed longer than it needed to be. Nonetheless, I soldiered on to read through to the end because of all the raves I’d heard from women whose literary tastes I respected.

I think that if the story had been streamlined, I would’ve liked it better and that’s why I’m hopeful that in the film version, that’s exactly what will have taken place. Normally I wax poetic about the beauty of the written word and how the dead tree book versions of any story are generally superior to the cinematic interpretations. But in this case, I’m hoping that the opposite is true and that the film, set for an August 10 release, is better than the book.

Great cast. (George Clooney, Ryan Gosling, Paul Giamatti, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Marisa Tomei, Rachel Evan Wood)


Great topics. (Presidential politics, political consulting, ideology, duplicity, public integrity)

Great timing. (Slated for an October 7 release, just as the presidential primaries should be heating up)

The Ides of March.

This better be good.

A Week of Pop Culture Goodies: 'HP7,' 'Secretariat,' 'Rescue Me,' 'Weeds' & 2 Comic Collections

Movies

The best film I saw over the course of last week was the final installment of the Harry Potter film series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which moved me, thrilled me and entertained me, flaws and all. While others may nitpick about not liking some of the changes made from J.K. Rowling’s sacred text (which I also adored), not appreciating the climatic Harry-Voldemort death scene, for example, I was okay with all of it. My 12-year-olds, who did indeed like the film, were nonetheless among those nitpickers who couldn’t get past the creative differences between the two works. They reviewed the film with me for CliqueClack Flicks here.



Over the weekend, my daughter and I found ourselves with some spare time, so I decided to check out our On Demand movies and settled upon the film Secretariat based on the true story of Penny Tweedy and her belief that she and her “Big Red” horse could overcome obstacles and sexism and doubt that Secretariat could win the triple crown.

It was eye opening to watch this with my 12-year-old daughter as she was appalled at the naked sexism lobbed at Tweedy as she was patronized and marginalized as a “housewife,” until she proved the boastful boobs wrong. The combination of doing her homework and studying up on the horseracing business, on horses, on the finances and not buying what other people were trying to tell her when she knew they were off base, combined with Tweedy's unshakable faith in her own gut instincts made Tweedy a hero, at least to the gal sitting next to me on the sofa. We need more films like this, more women like Tweedy.

TV

Rescue Me is two episodes into its final season and, thus far, it’s been a weird, yet entertaining ride. Not too hellishly dark, at least not yet, the travails of Tommy Gavin, as he tries to help his oldest daughter remain sober (never mind himself), provide comfort to his fortysomething wife who’s pregnant and to his former lover/his dead cousin’s wife as she struggles with a grown son who sustained horrendous injuries while on the job with Tommy, not to mention the hot button of the 10th anniversary of 9/11 that's fast approaching, have proven quite emotional and, at the same time, oddly amusing.

Another storyline which shows promise, Lou’s struggle with weight loss and his “emotional eating,” which has not only put his own health in danger, but the lives of his colleagues when he rushes into a burning building, physically unfit to help anyone else escape.

My review of the latest episode -- where the main question was whether the Gavin women really run the Gavin family and rule over Tommy’s life was prominent -- is over on CliqueClack TV.

Weeds: I’m not quite sure what I think about the bizarre turns this show has taken. Way back in the beginning, when suburban mom/PTA volunteer Nancy Botwin turned to dealing pot in order to keep her family afloat on the heels of the sudden death of her husband kind of made sense, if you’re of the mind that selling pot’s not a big deal. (It was along the Breaking Bad’s Walter White’s initial thinking: Do what you need to do to protect/help your family.)



Then, as Nancy delved further into the drug trade, she changed. She got that U-Turn tattoo. She started trying to play bad guys off of one another which led to her neighborhood being burned to the ground. She reveled in messing around with a Mexican drug kingpin/politician Esteban, even when he was violent toward her. Her unexpected pregnancy with Esteban's child was the only thing that saved her life and stopped him from murdering her. After a brief reconciliation, which I did not buy, Nancy fled after her middle son killed Esteban’s political ally. After last season, which was spent with the Botwins on the run, we’re into this odd New York City-centered/Nancy-in-a-halfway-house scenario where she’s kicked off a new drug dealing biz when she’s barely out of custody, and is forced to wear a parade around Manhattan in a series of horrific 80s duds that smell like sweat. It’s gone so far off the rails from its original, somewhat plausible conceit, yet I just cannot turn away.

Earlier this month, New York Magazine’s Jillian Goodman wrote a piece entitled, “How Weeds Has Gone Wrong, and How It Could Have Saved Itself.” Among her recommendations: “For this season to turn itself around, we need something newer than a new locale, which can easily become the ground for old mistakes,” Goodman wrote. “It’d be great to see Nancy learn from all the stupid sh*% she’s pulled in the last six seasons and get some real growth. There are only so many times we can see that same old slack-jawed-but-pouty-I’ve-been-caught face before we’re going to change the channel for good.”

Books

I’ve been reading Carson McCullers’ The Heart is a Lonely Hunter and it’s not what I thought it would be. I first heard about this book more than a decade ago in an episode of Once and Again. Former high school bulimic Judy Brooks, now a beautiful, confident book store owner, recommended it to the anorexic Jessie Sammler telling the young teen, “This book saved me.”

Later, when the troubled Jessie was alone in her bedroom, you heard Jessie’s voice-over reading some lines from the book about a young teenage girl that reflected how alienated Jessie feels from her own world, her family and her peers. “With her it was like there were two places – the inside room and the outside room. School and the family and the things that happened every day were in the outside room. . .  Foreign countries and plan and music were on the inside room.”

Another excerpt: “She could be in the middle of a house full of people and still feel like she was locked up by herself.”


So I started reading it expecting, well, I don’t know exactly what I was expecting . . . maybe the insightful eloquence of that late, great ABC drama. That’s not exactly what the book turned out to be. It  follows a young girl, Mick Kelly, who has connections to other characters who all, like her, feel like societal outcasts, but for very different reasons. It’s a thought-provoking read to be sure, just not the one I thought I was getting into when I cracked it open.

On the flip side of the coin, I was pleased to receive two collections of cartoons from illustrators who truly get the humor of what it’s like to be a work-from-home mother and raise children in the hovering, helicopter nuttiness of now. On the heels of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, I definitely need the laughs of Jan Eliot’s Stone Soup Brace Yourself and Terri Libenson’s Pajama Diaries Déjà To-Do.

Image credits: FX,Comics Kingdom, Stone Soup Comics.

'Mad Men'-Inspired Icy Coolness for a Sweltering Summer Day

Mad Men Opening Titles Re-Design from Paul Rogers on Vimeo.

While we won’t be able to enjoy any new installments of Don Draper, Peggy Olson, Roger Sterling and the gang until next year -- likely when there’ll be snow on the ground here in the Boston area -- illustrator Paul Rogers has created a refreshing new, 1960s-styled intro for Mad Men that’s so cool it can take a bit of the edge off of this heat wave.


Watching this makes me feel as though I’ve been transported back to the early 1960s, when TVs were boxy behemoths wearing rabbit ears and central AC wasn’t as prominent in American homes as it is today.

Video via Laughing Squid.

Notes on Pop Culture: Harry Potter on ‘Daily Show,’ Coach Taylor’s Speechifying, ‘Julie & Julia’ Inspiring & ‘The Mentalist’s’ Freshman Season

Daniel Radcliffe & Jon Stewart

How cute-as-a-button was Daniel Radcliffe (aka Harry Potter) on The Daily Show? Love how modest his is. (Amy Poehler lives in his building and he was adorable when he talked about her.) I hope his post-Potter career flourishes.



NY Magazine: The Best of Coach Taylor’s Inspiring Speeches

I’m really gonna miss Coach Taylor. Aren’t y'all?



Julie & Julia Still Inspires

The other night while flipping through the TV stations, I came across the movie Julie & Julia and decided to watch it again with my two sons (selectively muting the volume when I remembered that a cuss word was coming up or for one part of the film where Julia Child’s sex life was discussed by blogger Julie Powell). The film provided me with inspiration all over again, even on this third viewing. (I've also read both Powell’s book and Child’s memoir about her time in Paris.)

For Julia Child to create for herself a culinary and TV career from scratch in her late 30s and 40s, and to be doggedly persistent about it over a series of years, in the face of numerous obstacles and rejections, gives you hope, or at least it gives me hope for my quest to get my freshly completed manuscript published. It was sweet when my boys recognized this and said, “That’ll be you Mom!” when Julia Child, at long last, finally received that letter saying a publisher who wanted to publish her book.

The Mentalist Freshman Season

This past winter my eldest son and I happened upon The Mentalist one night when just he and I were home and we decided to give the show with the weird name a whirl. Turns out, we liked that quirky, suave fellow, Patrick Jane, and decided to give another Mentalist episode a try the following week. And we were hooked on the solved-in-an-hour drama.

After its extraordinarily tense season finale in May featuring the illusive Red John, I told my son that this summer, we’d go back to the beginning and learn Patrick’s backstory and how this Red John tale unfolded. The season one DVD has arrived, and the kid is now itchin’ to break into it. Patience, grasshopper.

Image credit: Amazon.

Notes on Politics: Searches & the TSA

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has been at the center of some mighty ethically murky news stories in the past few weeks, most centering on overly aggressive agents harassing citizens who have, frankly, had enough of all this handsy behavior. At the same time, the Department of Homeland Security has confirmed that since November 2001, there have been 25,000 breaches of airport security.

In the past several weeks, here are some of the stories which follow the TSA-agents-are-out-of-control storyline:



WASHINGTON – A woman was “pulled out of the security line after having gone through the Advance Imaging system (that see-through techonology) and told she needed a pat-down.” Why? The TSA agent wanted to search through her curly hair, which she had put up in a bun. “They put the gloves on and now, they’re really just digging around in my hair,” the woman said. A TSA supervisor told the woman that, “It’s our policy that we examine anything that poofs from the body.” (King 5 News)

TENNESSEE -- “A 41-year-old Clarksville woman was arrested after Nashville airport authorities say she was belligerent and verbally abusive to security officers, refusing for her daughter to be patted down at a security checkpoint.” The mother didn’t want to go through the scanner, saying, according to police reports, “I still don’t want someone to see our bodies naked” and did not want her young daughter to be “crotch grabbed.” (The Tennessean)

FLORIDA – A wheelchair riding 95-year-old woman “in the final stages of leukemia” was allegedly detained and told to remove her soiled adult diaper so the TSA agents could complete their physical pat-down of her. The woman “did not have another clean diaper with her.” The TSA denies these charges. (MSNBC)

NEW YORK– A Florida couple, both of whom use wheelchairs, complained about hand searches they were forced to undergo at the Greater Rochester International Airport which they said were invasive and insensitive. The husband said of his search, “They did the hair then did the neck. Then they had me do a pushup in my chair, then got down into my inner thigh around my back side. It’s the most thorough search [I’ve] had done in my life.” (Tampa Bay CBS affiliate)



NORTH CAROLINA– A 94-year-old wheelchair-bound Floridian was forced to be taken out of her wheelchair to stand in the security scanner, then was told she required a pat-down. The woman said of her pat-down, which was reportedly in full view of other passengers, “They took me to one side and they patted me down, and they made me stand . . . with my arms out, for over 10 minutes. I was beginning to feel that I wasn’t going to be able to continue to stand, I was going to fall down or something.” (Raleigh ABC affiliate)



WASHINGTON – A 6-year-old boy was pulled out of line by a TSA agent and subjected to two pat-downs after he’d gone through the scanner. His mother told the an NBC affiliate in Washington, “We all talk to our kids about improper touching, somebody shouldn’t touch you if you don’t want to be touched, and we had no time to talk with him about what they were really doing.” (Washington NBC affiliate)



ARIZONA – A 61-year-old Colorado woman apparently had had enough of what she said she has to “go through every week,” and reportedly turned to a female TSA agent and allegedly “squeezed and twisted the agent’s breast with both hands.” The woman was busted on “felony charges of sexual assault and held briefly in the Maricopa County Jail.” Authorities say, however, she won't be prosecuted for sexual assault. The TSA responded by saying, “the agency will not tolerate assaults against its workforce.” Apparently the TSA has never heard of the old chestnut, “The pot calling the kettle black.” (New York Post)

Now it seems as though the woman, Yukari Mihamae, is becoming the Steven Slater of the airline passenger set as Facebook pages have popped up in her defense, including one called “Acquit Yukari Mihamae" where a commenter compared her to “a 21st century Rosa Parks.” (MSNBC)

In the meantime, the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee on National Security, Homeland Defense and Foreign Operations took the TSA to task during a hearing, saying that there have been 25,000 “breaches of secured airport perimeters reported since November 2001,” according to The Hill. Further, “more than 14,000 people were able to access sensitive areas of the airport and some 6,000 passengers and carry-on luggage were able to make it past government checkpoints without proper security,” ABC News reported.

Hmm, something’s not working here, is it?

An Ode to 'Friday Night Lights:' Goodbye Dillon, Texas

Thirty-three minutes into the pilot episode of Friday Night Lights, Jason Street, the beautiful, smart, kind, polite, going-places Dillon quarterback with the gorgeous cheerleader girlfriend became paralyzed in freak accident during Eric Taylor’s very first game as head coach. In the days leading up to the game, people none-too-subtly told Eric, who wore a perpetually worried look on his face, that the pressure was on and that if he didn’t guide the team properly, he’d be gone.



Buddy Garrity was still married, Buddy Jr. was a little kid and there was a grand to-do celebrating the opening of his car dealership.

Sophomore Matt Saracen was complaining that he’d never get the chance to set foot on the field because Jason was so good at QB-1.

Julie Taylor, who was reading Moby Dick, compared her father to Captain Ahab and the town of Dillon to the elusive Moby Dick.

Tyra Collette flirted wildly with lots of guys even though she was the hard-drinking Tim Riggins’ gal pal.

At the end of that first episode Eric, who was emotionally crushed by Jason's injury, said, “We, at some point in our lives, fall. We will all fall.”



Now, on the cusp of the series finale of Friday Night Lights, I can honestly say that the show ended on a high note. The Taylors have weathered all manner of family crises, including in season two when Eric was living away from home part-time and Tami was pregnant, when Eric was replaced as Dillon’s coach and handed a non-existent football program at a financially strapped school and when Tami was drummed out of her Dillon principal’s position after she dared to have a conversation with a girl who attended East Dillon about the girl’s accidental pregnancy. The original group of Dillon high schoolers has left and new students, attending East Dillon took their places on the show and have done so seamlessly.



I’ve loved the earthy Taylor marriage and how Tami rarely let Eric get away with stuff. The scenes where they planned date nights, when they demonstrated that, after all this time, they were still into one another, were wonderful. In an episode this season, after Eric had been drinking with his fellow coaches at an away game, he called Tami from his hotel room and asked, “What y’all wearin’?” hoping for phone sex.



As the Friday Night Lights book closes, we learned that Jason Street has thrived, despite the tragedy that befell him in episode one when his entire sense of who he was and what he’d do with his life was shaken to its core. Now a husband and a father, Jason evolved into a confident sports agent, complete with his own business card and that trademark, All-American smile on his face.



Matt, who always seemed older than his age as he shouldered more responsibilities than someone his age should have to, finally stopped martyring himself. He went away to school in Chicago to chase his dreams and utilize his artistic talents. His future looks bright.

Tim, whose best days seemed to have been left behind on the playing field, is now an ex-con and has no idea what he’s going to do next.



What’ll happen to Jess Merriweather, who dreams of becoming a football coach, to Vince Howard, who hopes (like the other East and West Dillon players before him) to go to college and play pro ball, to Becky Sproles, who seems lost without parental guidance but has found puppy love with Luke Cafferty, who’s learning that football scholarships aren’t abundant? We’ll have to use our collective imaginations to picture what might’ve become of their futures had Friday Night Lights gone on for more seasons.

It was a down-to-earth, smart and enjoyable ride while it lasted. Thanks y'all.

Emmy Nominations: Love for 'Friday Night Lights,' 'Mad Men' & 'Modern Family'

Image credit: NBC via New York Post.

As it rounds the corner of its final season, Friday Night Lights and its two lead actors, Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton, have received Emmy nominations for the wonderful conclusion to the series which moved and delighted me. Though it’s highly unlikely that FNL will receive any Emmys -- it’s up against Mad Men, Boardwalk Empire, Dexter and Game of Thrones in best drama, Chandler faces Mad Men’s Jon Hamm who had a stupendous year while Britton is competing with Julianna Margulies’ powerhouse turn in The Good Wife), it’s nice to see the gang from Dillon, Texas get some props for a change.



And it was a testament to the outstanding high quality of the humor, writing and performances in Modern Family to see that all the parents in the show were nominated for an Emmy, the show is in contention for best comedy (an honor it won last year) and one of its funniest episodes, “Caught in the Act,” is vying for best comedy writing. It’s been nominated for 17 Emmys, deservedly so.

Image credit: AMC.

Then there’s my beloved Mad Men which has been nominated for 19 Emmys. A favorite for best drama, which it has won for three consecutive years, the amazing Don and Peggy-centric episode “The Suitcase”  (where they stayed up all night working on the Samsonite campaign) was nominated for best writing, Miss Blankenship (Randee Heller) was nominated for best guest actress and Elisabeth Moss is up for best actress.

Other nominations that made my day: Amy Poehler for Parks and Recreation, Michelle Forbes for her poignant work on The Killing and Andre Braugher’s Men of a Certain Age nod.

Who was left out of the Emmy 2011 party?

All the folks from Parenthood. No nominations. Zip. Nada. I thought for sure that Peter Krause would be on the list for his Adam Braverman (I’m thinking specifically about the episode where he punched the guy in the grocery store for mocking his son who has Asperger’s), or Mae Whitman for her portrayal of troubled teen Amber Holt.

Rescue Me. Its sixth season was strong and powerful and grim as Denis Leary’s Tommy Gavin, like Don Draper, hit his alcoholic rock bottom. (Both depictions were ugly and gripping.) Certainly the series and Leary deserved nominations.

Ray Romano. He proved, in his second season as the put-upon divorced dad Joe with a gambling problem on Men of a Certain Age, that he has acting chops.

Michael B. Jordan as Vince Howard from Friday Night Lights. During these past two seasons, Jordan has given an achingly beautiful performance as the East Dillon Lions’ quarterback who struggled with his previous criminal entanglements with deadly gangs, with his father returning to the fold after serving jail time (and disappointing his son by reverting to substance abuse), his mother’s rehab from drug addiction and omnipresent poverty.
Nick Offerman from Parks and Recreation. Just for the episode where he sported dreadlocks. Ron Swanson's Pyramid of Greatness. Seriously. He made me laugh out loud.
 
The folks from The Middle. I adored the episode where Frankie and Mike Heck attempted to "take back" the house from their kids but, inevitably, failed.

What nominations pleased you? Which omissions annoyed you?

Image credits: New York Post, Michael Yarish/AMC.

Notes on Pop Culture: Favorite Flicks, Shows, Etc. from Past Week

Movies

While I’m planning on seeing the biggest movie of the summer this coming opening weekend – I speak, of course, of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 – I finally got to go to the delightfully air conditioned movie theater and enjoy Woody Allen’s latest offering, Midnight in Paris.

As someone who’s in the midst of tweaking my own novel and who has sought feedback from trusted sources, I identified with Owen Wilson’s naïve, romantic, insecure writer character, Gil who was fearful of letting folks take a peek at his manuscript lest they rip it apart and, in a way, destroy him. However when Wilson’s Gil got the chance to go back in time and enjoy 1920s Paris with the likes of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Pablo Picasso and Cole Porter, that’s where the similarities end.

This movie about learning to appreciate what you’ve got, taking chances and daring to follow your dreams was clearly written by a dreamer. Maybe that’s why I liked it so much.



TV


Women’s World Cup: Quarterfinals game. Against Brazil. Amazingly inspiring for all the sports-minded members of my household. The real-life, come-from-behind drama created by the U.S. Women’s World Cup team this weekend trumped even the inspirational Nike ad the team stars in.

Friday Night Lights: In preparation for a piece about the end of Friday Night Lights (*sniff*), I watched the first two episodes of the drama where, 33 minutes into the pilot episode, the clean cut, sweet, police hero high school quarterback is paralyzed during a pivotal play. Five seasons later, the show hasn’t lost its mojo. It’s so sad that the series will end this Friday evening.

Want to relive the Panthers/Lions glory? The entire series will be replayed on ESPN Classic, according to the New York Times. Starting tonight, ESPN will air those same first two episodes starting at 8 p.m., followed by a marathon of the first season on ESPN Classic on Thursday and Friday. The series will begin regularly airing episodes on Thursday evenings on ESPN Classic starting July 21, the paper reported.

Newspapers/Magazines

In this past Sunday’s New York Times, the co-creators of The Good Wife, Robert and Michelle King wrote an op/ed about how strange the real-life marital twists of politicians’ love lives have turned out to be. Talking about everyone from Weiner, Schwarzenegger and Edwards to Spitzer and Sanford, they said, “Speaking as television writers: [The melodrama] is over the top.”

“One can imagine the studio notes,” the couple wrote. “’We like the husband who impregnates his housekeeper, but keeping her in the same house for a decade seems a bit mustache-twirling.’ ‘Love the presidential candidate cheating with the videographer, but do you need the wife to have cancer?’ ‘Tweeting semi-naked photos from the congressional gym: good – very hip. But making his wife pregnant: isn’t that too on-the-nose?’”

T-Minus 4 Days 'Til Last 'Potter' Film: Let's Recap, Shall We?

Warner Brothers is trying to gin up anticipation among Harry Potter fans with this retrospective video which features highlights from all the previous Potter films and a few scenes from the new film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.

They, along with ABC Family which has been running Potter movies all weekend long (we saw Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone on TV Thursday night), are working my resident Potterheads into a veritable frenzy. (Meanwhile, my 12-year-old daughter has been hurriedly re-reading as much of the book series as she can -- for the billionth time -- before we see the film this coming weekend.)

I hope the movie does justice to the moving end of the series in the book. I'd really like the series to go out strong.

The Harry Potter Series . . . Lookin' Fabulous in Cartoon Form

Image credit: Lucy Knisley

These are too cute for words. The Harry Potter books . . . in cartoon form.

I discovered Lucy Knisley’s clever cartoon interpretations of the Harry Potter series via USA Today’s Pop Candy blogger. Knisley takes each book and chronicles the tale via brilliant illustrations. They remind me a bit of of Dyna Moe’s Mad Men illustrations in that they put a unique twist on the dramatic scenes she depicts.

You can see them in a larger format on her web site. It's worth the visit.

Image credit: Lucy Knisley.

Meryl Streep as Thatcher in 'Iron Lady' Trailer

Given my previous blog entry about the documentary Miss Representation, which examines how women are depicted in the media and the impact of seeing very few women in leadership positions on the gender composition of our elected leadership, this new "teaser" trailer for the film The Iron Lady, starring the fantastic Meryl Streep is right on the money.

In this short peek, Streep's Margaret Thatcher is being told that her hat, her pearls and her voice are all strikes against her if she were going to seriously run for office. Love her push-back.

‘Miss Representation’ Documentary: I Want to See This Really Badly

Newest Miss Representation Trailer (a 2011 Sundance Film Festival Official Selection) from on Vimeo.

Not only do I want to see this film, Miss Representation – a 2011 Sundance official film festival selection – because I write and am interested in the intersection of pop culture and politics, but because I’m the mother of an impressionable 12, almost 13-year-old girl who’s soaking all of this in and trying to figure out where she fits in in the world of today’s girls.

As the mother of two boys – one age 12, almost 13, and another almost 10 – I wonder about the messages that they receive about girls’ and women’s roles in the world.

For example, after the Boston Bruins won the Stanley Cup and there was a celebratory parade in Boston – which my 9-year-old son and my husband attended – my daughter asked me whether there’ve been any parades for female athletes and if not, why not. She’s lived through Boston parades for the Red Sox (twice), the Patriots and the Celtics, all of which we watched on TV or attended.

I had no answer for her, none that would be satisfactory.

Though we’ve all, as a family, been watching the Women’s World Cup games, it’s hard for me to justify or explain to her why the women receive precious little coverage in the sports pages of the newspaper as compared to when the USA men’s team was in contention.

I really want to see this documentary.

Notes on Pop Culture: Some Favorite TV Shows, Magazines & Articles from Past Week

Now that it’s summer and things, pop culture-wise, tend to wind down a bit -- particularly when it comes to fresh TV programming -- I’m bringing back my favorite picks of the week, pop culture/politics items I’ve enjoyed over the past week.

TV


Image credit: USA

Covert Affairs: Still Light, Still Fun

I get bored easily with stupid TV shows and hardly ever watch anything reality-based, preferring, instead, scripted television, usually of the darker and heavier variety. The comedy programs to which I gravitate usually have some heft and/or intelligence to them because I loathe stupid, forced crap which simply bugs the heck out of me.

I would’ve thought that by now, I would’ve grown tired of USA’s Alias Lite, its summer CIA fare Covert Affairs, about rookie CIA agent Annie Walker who has a big heart, a killer smile, a quick mind and a powerful take-down. But Covert Affairs’ sophomore season has been solid, entertaining and enjoyable.

The show is populated by plenty of actors you’ve seen before – Peter Gallagher (Rescue Me, The O.C.), Kari Matchett (24, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Invasion), Anne Dudek (House, Big Love, Mad Men), Sendhil Ramamurthy (Heroes) and Gregory Itzin (24, Big Love, The Mentalist) – and boasts two breakout stars, Piper Perabo, who’s positively charming as Annie, and Christopher Gorham (Ugly Betty) as Annie’s wise mentor, Auggie Anderson.

Covert Affairs isn’t filled with a heavy mythology that sometimes bogged down Alias, and it doesn’t insult your intelligence either. The latest episode, which featured Mark Moses (Desperate Housewives, Mad Men) as a guest star, was a good example of how Covert Affairs balances its spy intrigue with a light touch. (See my review of it on CliqueClack TV.) 

Image credit: TNT

Men of a Certain Age: Ray Romano Packed a Powerful Emotional Punch in Second Season

The TNT drama Men of a Certain Age had its finale this week, capping a strong second season that brought each of the three, middle-aged, down-to-earth main characters down different paths than one might have envisioned for them.

Ray Romano’s Joe took a detour from his rekindled dream of joining the senior [golfing] tour to traverse down a rather dark road by doing some freelance bookmaking on the side (poaching clients from his own cancer-addled bookie, then thinking twice about it and giving up being a bookie altogether). Just as Andre Braugher’s Owen finally seemed to be gaining in confidence as he took over the helm of his father’s car dealership, he was plagued by panic attacks. Meanwhile Scott Bakula’s Terry -- the Zen, surfer dude aspiring actor closing in on age 50 -- has settled down, taken a full-time job and no longer wants to play the field and sleep with everything that moves; he actually wants an adult relationship with a woman his own age.

This past season Romano stood out as a revelation.

Magazines/Newspapers

EW’s Potter Issue

Love, love, LOVED this week’s issue of Entertainment Weekly dedicated to all things Harry Potter. A fan’s delight, the package provides all manner of cool trivia about the $2 billion film series, which comes to a close on July 15 when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 hits the theaters.

If you’re a fan of Harry Potter, this is a must read.

FYI -- My pop culture column over on Modern Mom this week focuses on the wonderful message about the importance of parents and parent-like role models that the Potter series has given my three resident Potter-heads.

New Yorker Fiction Issue

I rarely buy the New Yorker. But when I stopped by my local independent bookstore – yes, an actual brick and mortar store -- seeking a periodical to bring on the airplane during my family’s trip to Orlando (and our pilgrimage to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios), I impulsively picked up the June 13 & 20 Summer Fiction issue and wound up reading quite a bit of it, including the odd little story, “Home” by George Saunders and Lauren Groff’s “Above and Below.”

New York Times & Politicians' Kids

Frank Bruni penned a provocative essay for the New York Times this past weekend in which he suggested that politicians stop parading their families around as presidential campaign props and then turn around and declare them off-limits for other people to discuss. Citing the Obamas’ desire to keep their daughters “off limits” to the media, Bruni said the Obamas also try to have things both ways. “That’s one of the problems with converting progeny into props,” he said. “It has a facile, cheap tinge.”

Citing other presidential candidates who’ve also brought their children on the campaign trail, Bruni is not a fan of the practice. “Because so many politicians make such a studied pose out of their parenthood, it’s fair to point out that jumping into the fray of a national campaign and hauling the clan into an unforgiving spotlight don’t necessarily do children any favors, especially if they’re young,” he wrote. “For all the candidates chatter about building a better tomorrow for their kids, they may be building a worse today.”

Image credits: USA, TNT, Entertainment Weekly.

I’ve Been Vacationing for a Week . . . What Did I Miss?

So the family and I trekked to Orlando this past week to partake of the glories of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, the stomach-clenching thrills of the Universal Studios theme park, the splashes of the chlorinated water rides at Aquatica, the wonders of marine life at Sea World (where we sat in the back during the killer whale show, and learn about NASA history at the Kennedy Space Center where the last space shuttle, Atlantis, is currently sitting on the launch site aiming for a July 8 lift-off.

And while the kiddos, The Spouse and I enjoyed ourselves in spite of frequent rain – and despite the fact that an employee at the Three Broomsticks restaurant in the Wizarding World told me that it was “against the law” to serve me (a person with a dairy allergy) the non-dairy Butterbeer drink sans the dairy topping (??!!) . . . I partook of a delightful Pumpkin Fizz instead – I, a political junkie, was sad to have missed a boatload of news:

As my family was making its way to the airport last week, one of the top 10 Most Wanted criminals in the nation, Whitey Bulger who hails from Boston, was arrested after 16 years on the lam, in California and, from what I could gather via Twitter, it was a veritable media circus as he was taken into custody and transported to Massachusetts, topped off with a $14,000 helicopter ride yesterday taking him from Plymouth to his court date in Boston via the air. I guess my family members weren't the only ones going on pricey rides this past week.

As I was busy riding on Universal Studios’ Men in Black ride multiple times (always accruing the least amount of points compared to everyone else), news came down about the Blagojevich conviction which the Chicago Tribune described thusly: “A federal jury Monday convicted Rod Blagojevich of sweeping corruption, putting an end to a tragicomic legal and political drama that brought down Illinois’ showy and would-be populist former governor. In its 10th day of deliberations, the 11-woman, one-man jury convicted Blagojevich of several shakedown attempts, including allegations that he brazenly tried to sell President Barack Obama’s old U.S. Senate seat in 2008.” I kept thinking about the kooky Rod “The Hair” Blago going to prison as we headed over to the Simpsons’ ride, featuring one of America’s most dysfunctional families.

I was packing my suitcase to leave for Orlando when the president made his snoozy address about our troops in Afghanistan but I didn’t get a chance to indulge myself and imbibe copious amounts of follow-up news analysis. I did, however, later take my 9-year-old through the Marvel comics sections of Universal Studios park where the good guys always win and always seem confident. Hmmm . . .

As the political hubbub about U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s presidential run escalated (from her being called a “flake” by a TV newsman and people mocking her for messing up Revolution era history, to the media’s discomfort as they once again grapple with locating the correct language to use when talking about a female presidential candidate, as one political pundit likened the media attacks on “conservative women” to “near-gynecological exams”), I was introducing my kiddos to the works of an award-winning actress named Lucille Ball. (FYI -- While I agree that all women, especially conservative ones, are savaged by the media, invoking gynecology is just . . . well . . . the male pundit shouldn’t have gone there. Seriously.)


But despite the fact that my news came mainly from my Twitter feed during the past week, I made up for the fact that I was in a family vacation bubble and wanted more news by reveling in spending way too many hours in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter (buying "magical" wands for the kids, among other souvenirs), riding only the tamest of rides (I’m not an amusement ride kinda gal) and being accosted all over the place for wearing my Boston Red Sox baseball cap, mostly positively accosted . . . even when confronted (playfully) by Yankees fans.

If only the three Chocolate Frogs we bought (they're Potter-themed candy) hadn't gotten somewhat mangled by the time we got home. See how nice they looked BEFORE we attempted to keep them cool in ice as we traveled to the airport, then packed them up in a suitcase?