MJZiggy
10-11-2006, 03:56 PM
Can't believe it took a female to find this...
Nick Bakay's Manly House of Football (Week 6)
By Nick Bakay
Special to NFL.com
(Oct. 11, 2006) -- Welcome to another exciting episode of "gripes & fantasies:"
NB CONFIDENTIAL: I am not a Beatles fan. I know, I know, it's a crime against humanity, and I have no doubt this admission has every other person on the planet regarding me as some sort of circus freak.
So be it. I am what I am. That being said, I still remember my delight back in 1974 when John Lennon dropped by the Monday Night Football booth and chatted with Howard Cosell. It was revolutionary. Counter-culture stars just didn't "do" football games back in 1974, and at the time, Lennon was a complete recluse. Worlds collided, it was beautiful, and it may have been the only time a "visitor" in a football booth actually worked … which brings us to another installment of network notes, and a disturbing TV trend alert:
ACTOR INTERVIEWS IN THE BOOTH MUST CEASE AND DESIST: Like many of you, I'm a hard-working guy who enjoys his football. After a long day of polishing egos and punching up scripts that have been punched up 15,000 times before, I like to ice up a glass of something lethal and watch a game in primetime. Maybe I'm a freak, but I like the football part of it. I really do. Isolate some shots of fighting in the trenches, toss me a couple of scores, and I'm happier than a lifer on a conjugal visit.
I don't need no stinkin' opening songs, no up close and personal b.s., and I sure as hell don't need to spend 10 minutes with some actor prattling on about his latest project. Isn't that why the simpleminded have Access Hollywood?
This is officially an epidemic with a serious side effect. It's getting to the point where you can't tune into a game without spending some unwanted quality time with Corey Feldman.
I don't mean to pick on the weak. In reality, these are lambs deployed by PR firms and network promotion departments into situations they should avoid, but here's the cold, hard truth: When actors don't have writers spoon feeding them content, they are as empty as the husk that wraps a tamale.
Think of them as feral cats -- fascinating to look at, instinctive, interpretive, and the camera loves that wee dollop of crazy in their eyes, but there's no easy way to say this: They no think good.
I'm not talking about performers who also generate their own material -- those who write, do standup comedy, generate ideas. You can make a case that these hybrids are as sharp as they come. I'm talking about actors who spend their whole life doing abdominal crunches while waiting for a script to arrive in the mail and make them whole again. I am something of an authority on this, having spent the last 20 years or so writing dialogue that, when properly executed, endowed a thousand mouth-breathing narcissists with the illusion of a personality. For anyone naive enough to think actors come up with those pithy, witty dialogue nuggets on their own, well … just listen to the prattle currently playing at a primetime football game near you, and get back to me.
Our complaints about sideline reporters seem to have landed. They still talk too much, but they are finally cutting off before the snap. It's not just me, right? It's better. Tragically, our moaning about actor interviews has not been met with the same response. Two heinous examples from last weekend:
It'd be a lot cooler if Matthew McConaughey didn't dominate the third quarter.
It'd be a lot cooler if Matthew McConaughey didn't dominate the third quarter.
On Wednesday night, the Marshall game on ESPN featured, I kid you not, 11 minutes of Matthew McConaughey plugging a movie. I mean no disrespect to the theme of the movie -- how Marshall's football program was rocked by tragedy and fought extinction. I'm all for it, as is anyone who has ever marveled at Randy Moss, Chad Pennington, and all the subsequent beneficiaries of that valiant effort, but 11 minutes of unscripted McConaughey? I have never loved my mute button more. It was a brutal, self-serving 11 minutes in the third quarter of a game with a 13-9 score. In other words, still anyone's ballgame. Talk about football existentialism: It was the only game on that night!!! Like "No Exit," you couldn't even jump to another tilt! The only saving grace was the befuddled look on Lou Holtz's face, which seemed to say, "Why am I standing for 11 minutes, who is this guy, and why is he talking over a Central Florida touchdown drive?" Which he was.
My football week started out rough, then it left me in a far more minor key, thanks to an epic cross-platform promotional misfire on Monday Night Football. Ravens vs. Broncos -- admittedly a defensive struggle, but I kinda like tough, close football. Again, I'm a circus freak.
There is 9:32 left in the second quarter, 3-0 Ravens, and here comes James Denton, who I believe plays some sort of assassin/hunk/notary public on Desperate Housewives, and an entire nation got kicked in the under-groin by yet another inane plug-fest, featuring golden moments like these:
Tony Kornheiser firing the tough questions about a storyline that involved Denton's character being in a coma, during which he grew a beard. The riveting response: "You know, the facial hair thing's been a big deal for the character, but they had Teri Hatcher shaving me while I was in the coma, so that was a pretty good gig…"
Okay, call me when they have Siegfried or Roy shave you. Come on, a major character in a prolonged coma? That's Days of our Lives crap, and yet I'd kill for him to fall into one right now!
Who wants to watch football when you can stare into James Denton's eyes?
Who wants to watch football when you can stare into James Denton's eyes?
No such luck. We hear a big crowd reaction. Mike Tirico tells us the Ravens have taken a timeout and Brian Billick is "hot at the officials!" Apparently I've got a coach melting down on a ref, but we're still gazing into Denton's dreamy eyes. There is no "vision" in television, so I can only guess at what is happening on the field.
We come back from commercial break, and mercifully, he is gone … no he's not! (GAME CLOCK: 7:46) Kornheiser is asking Denton to rate the "hot" women on his show, in order of "the ones you'd like to sleep with."
TiVo paused.
Correct answer (assuming he's single): "None of them. They're all neurotic nightmares and I've got my eye on the hot production assistant who just moved to town after graduating from Emerson."
My prediction: He'll bail and be diplomatic… Advantage: Me
Denton: (BIG LAUGH) "You're absolutely out of your mind…"
No, I am, because this is what I'm subjected to when I'm trying to watch a football game … I'm ready to stab my eardrums with a knitting needle.
(GAME CLOCK: 6:22) Meanwhile, in a 3-0 defensive battle, Tatum Bell breaks off a 12-yard run, and the Broncos have moved the ball all the way to the Ravens 26. Do I get to focus on that? Nope. Now Denton's back pimping an ESPN series he's voicing over -- some show that involves running, kayaking, and (now I'm gasping for mercy) biking. Please kill me.
Where is McConaughey when I need him?
FINAL MNF INTERVIEW TIMING:
GAME TIME: 5:23
REAL TIME: 8 minutes
It all begs the question: Who do you think you're appealing to? Denton clearly gets filed under the heading "a little something for the ladies." Unfortunately, most of the ladies aren't there. They're off watching lady-stuff on lady-target networks. Perhaps the split-end excitement of Hair Trauma -- a show that may sound like a parody, but is real and playing on the WE Network, which I suspect stands for "women's entertainment." More power to them, but they ain't watching Ravens 3, Broncos 0.
In the immortal words of J.J. Hunsecker: I often wish I were dead and wore a hearing aid… with a simple flick of a switch I could shut out the greedy murmur of little men…
Are we kids, or what?
Here's the link to the rest of the blog
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/9720727
Nick Bakay's Manly House of Football (Week 6)
By Nick Bakay
Special to NFL.com
(Oct. 11, 2006) -- Welcome to another exciting episode of "gripes & fantasies:"
NB CONFIDENTIAL: I am not a Beatles fan. I know, I know, it's a crime against humanity, and I have no doubt this admission has every other person on the planet regarding me as some sort of circus freak.
So be it. I am what I am. That being said, I still remember my delight back in 1974 when John Lennon dropped by the Monday Night Football booth and chatted with Howard Cosell. It was revolutionary. Counter-culture stars just didn't "do" football games back in 1974, and at the time, Lennon was a complete recluse. Worlds collided, it was beautiful, and it may have been the only time a "visitor" in a football booth actually worked … which brings us to another installment of network notes, and a disturbing TV trend alert:
ACTOR INTERVIEWS IN THE BOOTH MUST CEASE AND DESIST: Like many of you, I'm a hard-working guy who enjoys his football. After a long day of polishing egos and punching up scripts that have been punched up 15,000 times before, I like to ice up a glass of something lethal and watch a game in primetime. Maybe I'm a freak, but I like the football part of it. I really do. Isolate some shots of fighting in the trenches, toss me a couple of scores, and I'm happier than a lifer on a conjugal visit.
I don't need no stinkin' opening songs, no up close and personal b.s., and I sure as hell don't need to spend 10 minutes with some actor prattling on about his latest project. Isn't that why the simpleminded have Access Hollywood?
This is officially an epidemic with a serious side effect. It's getting to the point where you can't tune into a game without spending some unwanted quality time with Corey Feldman.
I don't mean to pick on the weak. In reality, these are lambs deployed by PR firms and network promotion departments into situations they should avoid, but here's the cold, hard truth: When actors don't have writers spoon feeding them content, they are as empty as the husk that wraps a tamale.
Think of them as feral cats -- fascinating to look at, instinctive, interpretive, and the camera loves that wee dollop of crazy in their eyes, but there's no easy way to say this: They no think good.
I'm not talking about performers who also generate their own material -- those who write, do standup comedy, generate ideas. You can make a case that these hybrids are as sharp as they come. I'm talking about actors who spend their whole life doing abdominal crunches while waiting for a script to arrive in the mail and make them whole again. I am something of an authority on this, having spent the last 20 years or so writing dialogue that, when properly executed, endowed a thousand mouth-breathing narcissists with the illusion of a personality. For anyone naive enough to think actors come up with those pithy, witty dialogue nuggets on their own, well … just listen to the prattle currently playing at a primetime football game near you, and get back to me.
Our complaints about sideline reporters seem to have landed. They still talk too much, but they are finally cutting off before the snap. It's not just me, right? It's better. Tragically, our moaning about actor interviews has not been met with the same response. Two heinous examples from last weekend:
It'd be a lot cooler if Matthew McConaughey didn't dominate the third quarter.
It'd be a lot cooler if Matthew McConaughey didn't dominate the third quarter.
On Wednesday night, the Marshall game on ESPN featured, I kid you not, 11 minutes of Matthew McConaughey plugging a movie. I mean no disrespect to the theme of the movie -- how Marshall's football program was rocked by tragedy and fought extinction. I'm all for it, as is anyone who has ever marveled at Randy Moss, Chad Pennington, and all the subsequent beneficiaries of that valiant effort, but 11 minutes of unscripted McConaughey? I have never loved my mute button more. It was a brutal, self-serving 11 minutes in the third quarter of a game with a 13-9 score. In other words, still anyone's ballgame. Talk about football existentialism: It was the only game on that night!!! Like "No Exit," you couldn't even jump to another tilt! The only saving grace was the befuddled look on Lou Holtz's face, which seemed to say, "Why am I standing for 11 minutes, who is this guy, and why is he talking over a Central Florida touchdown drive?" Which he was.
My football week started out rough, then it left me in a far more minor key, thanks to an epic cross-platform promotional misfire on Monday Night Football. Ravens vs. Broncos -- admittedly a defensive struggle, but I kinda like tough, close football. Again, I'm a circus freak.
There is 9:32 left in the second quarter, 3-0 Ravens, and here comes James Denton, who I believe plays some sort of assassin/hunk/notary public on Desperate Housewives, and an entire nation got kicked in the under-groin by yet another inane plug-fest, featuring golden moments like these:
Tony Kornheiser firing the tough questions about a storyline that involved Denton's character being in a coma, during which he grew a beard. The riveting response: "You know, the facial hair thing's been a big deal for the character, but they had Teri Hatcher shaving me while I was in the coma, so that was a pretty good gig…"
Okay, call me when they have Siegfried or Roy shave you. Come on, a major character in a prolonged coma? That's Days of our Lives crap, and yet I'd kill for him to fall into one right now!
Who wants to watch football when you can stare into James Denton's eyes?
Who wants to watch football when you can stare into James Denton's eyes?
No such luck. We hear a big crowd reaction. Mike Tirico tells us the Ravens have taken a timeout and Brian Billick is "hot at the officials!" Apparently I've got a coach melting down on a ref, but we're still gazing into Denton's dreamy eyes. There is no "vision" in television, so I can only guess at what is happening on the field.
We come back from commercial break, and mercifully, he is gone … no he's not! (GAME CLOCK: 7:46) Kornheiser is asking Denton to rate the "hot" women on his show, in order of "the ones you'd like to sleep with."
TiVo paused.
Correct answer (assuming he's single): "None of them. They're all neurotic nightmares and I've got my eye on the hot production assistant who just moved to town after graduating from Emerson."
My prediction: He'll bail and be diplomatic… Advantage: Me
Denton: (BIG LAUGH) "You're absolutely out of your mind…"
No, I am, because this is what I'm subjected to when I'm trying to watch a football game … I'm ready to stab my eardrums with a knitting needle.
(GAME CLOCK: 6:22) Meanwhile, in a 3-0 defensive battle, Tatum Bell breaks off a 12-yard run, and the Broncos have moved the ball all the way to the Ravens 26. Do I get to focus on that? Nope. Now Denton's back pimping an ESPN series he's voicing over -- some show that involves running, kayaking, and (now I'm gasping for mercy) biking. Please kill me.
Where is McConaughey when I need him?
FINAL MNF INTERVIEW TIMING:
GAME TIME: 5:23
REAL TIME: 8 minutes
It all begs the question: Who do you think you're appealing to? Denton clearly gets filed under the heading "a little something for the ladies." Unfortunately, most of the ladies aren't there. They're off watching lady-stuff on lady-target networks. Perhaps the split-end excitement of Hair Trauma -- a show that may sound like a parody, but is real and playing on the WE Network, which I suspect stands for "women's entertainment." More power to them, but they ain't watching Ravens 3, Broncos 0.
In the immortal words of J.J. Hunsecker: I often wish I were dead and wore a hearing aid… with a simple flick of a switch I could shut out the greedy murmur of little men…
Are we kids, or what?
Here's the link to the rest of the blog
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/9720727