Monday, January 29, 2007

Hmm, I vaguely remember there's something I want to watch tomorrow

  • Actors are wonderful, brilliant people. Apropos of nothing, Hugh Laurie won a Screen Actors Guild award yesterday from his peers and gave a sweet and, of course, amusing speech talking about how much it meant to him to be given the opportunity to excel in the role (though he said it more modestly). He's so dreamy.
  • Media in Canada's TV stories lead with a laughable headline for the Jan. 15-21 ratings article: House tumbles, but American Idol couldn't steal #1. The article goes on to mention that House fell from #1 to #30 in one week, without ever mentioning that it was a rerun on Global up against American Idol on CTV and FOX. Numbers are hard.
  • The New York Times, on the other hand, has a meatier explanation of something I heard for the first time at the Banff World Television Festival (see Inside House) - that when ratings were low at the beginning, David Shore had felt pressured to create the character of Vogler as House's nemesis. The article writer - Bill Carter, author of Desperate Networks - was at Banff too, though I have no idea if that's where he first heard about it. He's got a few more sources than I do. The article, House, Already Strong, Gets a Boost, talks about American Idol as House's savior and the casting that gave us the then-unlikely Hugh Laurie's indelible performance as the title character.
  • The episode synopsis for tomorrow's House looks really good. Which means nothing, but I've already blocked out the memory of my disappointment with the last episode and am psyched. And a little scared. I guess it's not fully blocked.
  • Canadians, the season finale of Intelligence is tomorrow too. You can watch both shows, even if they're on at the same time. I have my revered Eastern time zone feed, but Intelligence also airs Tuesdays at midnight and Fridays at 11. Or, you know, you could record one.