eXTReMe Tracker

Alternate Best Supporting Actor 2005: Ed Harris in A History of Violence

Ed Harris did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Carl Fogarty in A History of Violence.Ed Harris portrays the Philadelphia gangster who comes looking for diner owner Tom Stall who recently killed two men trying to rob his diner..

Best Supporting Actor 2011: Nick Nolte in Warrior

Nick Nolte received his third Oscar nomination for portraying Paddy Conlon in Warrior.Warrior details a winner take all mixed martial art tournament whose two main combatants are estranged brothers (Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton) fighting for their own difficult reasons.

Alternate Best Actor 2011

And the Nominees Were Not:Ryan Gosling in DriveRobert Wieckiewicz in In DarknessMichael Fassbender in ShameMichael Shannon in Take ShelterBrendan Gleeson in The Guard..

Monday, May 14, 2012

Best Supporting Actor 2006: Mark Wahlberg in The Departed

Mark Wahlberg received his first Oscar nomination for portraying Sgt. Sean Dingnam in The Departed.

The Departed tells about two police officers one an undercover cop (Leonardo DiCaprio) trying to bring down a crime boss (Jack Nicholson) and another (Matt Damon) working for the very same crime boss.

Out of the eventual best picture winner The Departed only one actor was nominated for an Oscar. Wahlberg was this actor, for whatever specific reason. Jack Nicholson as the film's villain was possibly the choice many would have thought would have been nominated, but maybe the Academy thought he should stay at least a little longer as tied for the most supporting actor nominations with Arthur Kennedy, Walter Brennan, and Claude Rains. I imagine though he was probably nominated by the nature of his character which is purposefully loud, and the whole point of his character really is to be a scene stealing character.

Wahlberg's whole point in the film as the Sgt. Dingnam is just to basically yell in a comedic fashion until just about the end of the film where he gets to quickly commit an act of wraith and vengeance. Dingnam really is a limited character, and Wahlberg really is not a great actor, in fact he seems to be a rather limited actor, but I will say one thing he does seem to do well is yell loudly and in a comedic fashion. This means he certainly fits for the role of Dingnam, his limits do work for the limited Dingnam. He actually is good enough at being a sort of a comedic relief for the film.

Wahlberg in all of his scenes talks loudly, and always has an abrasive thing to say about someone whenever he is on screen. He certainly is enjoyable enough in the role of Dingnam, and brings to life this abrasive quality certainly well enough. He also does do it in a humorous enough fashion that certainly works for the film, and the role without overplaying too much. He still does make Dingnam a man in the same film as the rest of the characters. He still shows Dingnam to be a cop who wants to do his job correctly, but he merely happens to show that he is does it in his only particular way.

This is not a great performance by Wahlberg by any means, but he serves his performance, even though it is rather limited. He does have his final very short scene showing a little bit of a different Dingnam clearly changed by the events of the film. There is no transition shown since Wahlberg is unapparent for a great deal of the film, but nevertheless Wahlberg handles the moment well. This is not an incredible performance but it is an entertaining one that achieves its rather limited goal. It will not be the performance that you really remember from the film, but it still does add to it in its own small way.

Help Wanted: Showrunners



Just left New York before the big Upfronts announcements – not that any of the networks would’ve invited me to any of their launch parties anyway. (“Levine doesn’t have a show and he eats all the shrimp!”) Big new trend this year: new series picked up without proven showrunners. How can you tell? When the networks told the lucky pilot creators they were on the schedule they reacted by

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Best Supporting Actor 2006: Alan Arkin in Little Miss Sunshine

Alan Arkin won his Oscar from his third nomination for portraying Edwin Hoover in Little Miss Sunshine.

Little Miss Sunshine tells the story of a dysfunctional family trying to make its way for the daughter Olive (Abigail Breslin) to make it into a children's beauty pageant.

Alan Arkin portrays the crusty old grandfather, who since it is an independent film of this sort is also a Heroine addict. The fact that he is a heroine addict really does not play into his performance, it plays into his character's fate, but Arkin really never portrays this as really all that important of a facet of his character. After all it never even shows the Grandfather after he has used the heroine, it only in fact shows him use it once, and we do not see any after effects. The point of his character really just comes in with him being a crusty old man apt to say one liners, and go off on rather salty tirades when he chooses to.

I must say Alan Arkin is quite good at the role set for him. He appropriately crusty, and actually quite amusing in the way he unabashedly portrays Edwin's various opinions as loudly as possible at times. Arkin is always effective in the role, and does perfectly realize this sort of character quite well. He never apologizes for the character, not once, which makes his performance far more effective than if he tried more visibly to make his character more likable in these moments. Arkin though actually does make Edwin actually fairly endearing, since he always makes it clear that Edwin merely is telling it the way he sees it.

Arkin makes all of Edwin's tirades quite enjoyable actually, as are his quick well timed little reactions or insertions into other conversations. It is an expertly done performance by Arkin actually because he really does play it straight for the most part. Yes he is meant to be humorous, and Arkin brings humor out the performance, but he always presents it through a realistic portrayal of a old man like Edwin. A part like this very easily can seem overwritten if the actor had overplayed the role, but Arkin never overplays Edwin finding just the right tone for him through his whole performance.

Arkin despite giving a largely comedic performance also does find a great deal of heart in his performance actually particularly in regards to Edwin's relationship to his granddaughter Olive. The scenes of Breslin and Arkin together I am sure is what helped both secure their nominations, as their is a surprising degree of warmth in their moments together. Arkin always shows that Edwin genuinely loves his granddaughter and always wants what is the very best for her. Their final scene together as well as when he convinces her to eat the ice cream despite the rather cruel objections of her father (Greg Kinnear), Arkin realizes a honest sweetness that actually is quite moving.

It is actually quite a challenge for Arkin to connect both his scenes of humorous crustiness, and his scenes of Edwin trying to be a good Grandfather and even father. His scene where he tries to encourage his son, is all terrifically handled by Arkin showing that even after all that flak he gives his son he still does love him. Arkin never fails to combine both sides of his character into one single characterization of this man. It would have been very easy to overplay the comedy, and completely forget the heart of his character, but Arkin succeeds in every respect. My only complaint was I wish he was in the entire film, but alas this is still a strong entertaining from Alan Arkin.

Live from the train

This is a first -- a live blog post. I'm on the Mariners train from New York to Boston. The team won today so I get to ride inside and not on the cow catcher.

At the moment we're stopped somewhere near New Haven to let another train pass. I'll be pissed if it's the Yankees.

As for the scenery -- picture the French countryside with landfills.

But there's something romantic about a

Happy Mothers' Day to all you moms and queens



HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!! Especially to the mom of my kids, Debby.



This year I'm spending Mother's Day the traditional way -- at Yankee Stadium, calling the Mariners-Yankees game on 701 ESPN Seattle, the Mariners Radio Network, and MLB.COM.  



But when you think of great mom's, who springs to mind first?  Why, Queen Elizabeth of course!   So for the first time ever, a blog post that

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Best Supporting Actor 2006: Eddie Murphy in Dreamgirls

Eddie Murphy received his first Oscar nomination for portraying James "Thunder" Early in Dreamgirls.

Dreamgirls tells about the rise of a group of black female soul singers.

Eddie Murphy joins the ranks of other comedians who would only nominated for being in roles where they are mostly not funny. As well know an actor can only win or most the time even be nominated for an Oscar for a comedic role if they are just as prolific with their dramatic work like Peter Ustinov, Walter Matthau, Kevin Kline, or Jack Lemmon. If you almost exclusively a comedic actor like Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, or Eddie Murphy you better make sure you role is mostly dramatic if you want to be nominated for that Oscar as Murray was.

Eddie Murphy plays James "Thunder" Early a flamboyant singer who takes on the three singers to be his backup early on. I must apologize for this review I really must. This is the only time this has ever happened to me in all my reviews of every performance that I have done. This entire performance by Eddie Murphy was impossible for me to separate from his previous performances. I really am sorry, but for whatever reason well I watching him here I could never detach this performance completely on his own.

For example James Early is suppose to be a charming energetic singer. I could never find myself actually seeing Eddie Murphy as charming here, not because he isn't charming. No the problem was for me was whenever he was being charming in Early's highly energetic fashion I could only see Eddie Murphy doing Buddy Love from the Nutty Professor. I honestly could not see him as the singer in this film, I only saw Buddy Love. It was driving me a little crazy actually that I could not separate this performance from his earlier work, but honestly I just could not.

This fact made it very difficult for me to really take him ever as this singer even though Murphy certainly is very believable in the singing scenes, but even they reminded me a little too much of his James Brown parody on Saturday Night Live. I just could never quite take this performance, well for lack of a better word, seriously. I never forgot his earlier work with his performance even though I did try best to look at it as a individual performance. I was never able to see it on its own terms, and because of that I never became invested in the character.

Murphy does put a lot of effort and energy in the part, doing his very best to show the charisma and constant  manic intensity in the performance scenes.  He also is believable enough, even though the film gives him very little time to deal with it, in portraying Early's later drug addiction and depression he faces later on. He does realize the part, but it never affected me as the film or Murphy wanted it to. The reason for this I would say mostly would be the fact that I could not detach his work here from his earlier comedic work. This certainly is a fine performance, but I can't say it was amazing. I also can't say I was really able to give this performance a fair shake, as I do believe my reaction could have been very different if I never say an Eddie Murphy performance before this one.

A long long Levine & Isaacs episode

This is one of my favorite episodes. Its from THE TONY RANDALL SHOW. David Isaacs and I wrote it in 1977. The premise stems from an article I saw in the paper. The scenario we present actually happened.

In case you're one of the two or three people in the entire world not familiar with THE TONY RANDALL SHOW, he played a judge in Philadelphia. The series was produced by MTM and created by

Twitter Delicious Facebook Digg Stumbleupon Favorites More