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‘Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip’ Soars in Episode Two

Bloggers, advertisers, network affiliates and The New York Times are all made to take their lumps in next Monday’s must-see episode of NBC’s Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.

This installment of Aaron Sorkin‘s new semi-serialized drama about the backstage challenges and conflicts at a late-night comedy series contains some of the most entertaining and revealing dialogue about television since the 1976 classic Network. It’s essential viewing for anyone who cares about where the medium has been, where it is today, where it’s going tomorrow and how it’s going to get there.

The second episode is a more entertaining hour than the pilot, which largely spun around something that had been seen before (a live on-camera rant by someone who says things about television that shouldn’t be said on television, done to greater dramatic impact in Network). The introductions of its various characters were distinctive but not necessarily compelling. Episode two, however, comes excitingly alive right out of the gate, with a scene that reveals more about brand new network entertainment president Jordan McDeere (Amanda Peet, suddenly intoxicating) than was offered in all of episode one.

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The setting is the first press conference for Jordan in her new position, as well as Matt Albie (Matthew Perry, the true star of this show) and Danny Tripp (Bradley Whitford), the two new head writers/executive producers of the NBS network’s all-important late-night franchise, a show not unlike NBC’s Saturday Night Live, except it is telecast from Los Angeles on Friday nights at an earlier hour (8:30 p.m., so as to be live on the East Coast). In the pilot, Jordan recruited Matt and Danny, two former writers who left the show many years earlier, to run it and restore it to its former glory.

“I believe that the people who watch television shows aren’t dumber than the people who make television shows,” Jordan tells the press. “I believe that quality is not anathema to profit.” With those remarks, she suddenly has the assembled journalists in the palm of her hand. But after Danny admits to having recently tested positive for cocaine, and Jordan makes a stupid follow-up crack about having been high when she hired him, the power in the room begins shifting back to the reporters. Jordan then cannot disguise her disgust when a reporter identifies herself as being from Rapture magazine (a fictional publication) and asks if the first show under the aegis of Matt and Danny will include a notorious sketch titled “Crazy Christians,” one they wrote during their earlier time on the show that was killed.

Jordan’s utter disdain for conservative religious groups bubbles up again and again in the scenes that follow. When she later demands to know why a reporter from Rapture was allowed in a NBS press conference, a network publicity executive notes that its circulation is “four times larger than Vanity Fair.” Later, when network chief Jack Rudolph (Steven Weber) tells Jordan that certain affiliates and advertisers have already heard and voiced their concerns about the sketch, and that he wants her to kill it, Jordan hisses, “How did the editor of Total Nutbar magazine get mobilized this fast?” She cares not one whit about viewers in Terre-Haute or people in other smaller markets who might be offended, suggesting that someone teach them how to change the channel.

For those who don’t know, this is how broadcast television works. Pressures come from every direction, and trouble begins when different points of view are not respected. Jordan is one of those television executives who always knows best, won’t listen to anyone and, more often than not, crashes and burns.

I won’t reveal what happens with the sketch or those concerned sponsors at the end of the episode, but there is a scene between Jordan and Jack that advertising executives will not want to miss, and about which they will probably have a good deal to say on Tuesday morning.

There is another sensationally illuminating sequence between Simon Stiles (D.L. Hughley) and Tommy Jeter (Nathan Corddry) that begins with Tommy fretting about a negative review for Studio 60 in a blog titled “Bernadette’s Blog.” “Quit reading the Internet,” Simon says. “Bernadette is writing that in her pajamas. She has a freezer full of Jenny Craig and she’s surrounded by her five cats!”

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Tommy offers a different perspective that will bring a smile to the face of more than one professional journalist. “The New York Times is going to quote Bernadette so the people can be heard and the Times can demonstrate they’re not the media elite,” he nervously explains. “I preferred when they were the media elite. I’m a fan of credentials! I’ve spent the last five years living a Roger Corman film called Revenge of the Hack. I have to care about the Internet because everybody else does!”

There are other marvelous moments throughout the hour. Matt tears into his mostly male writing staff for dressing like they’re “in junior high school.” Harriet (Sarah Paulson), a cast member of Studio 60 and former girlfriend of Matt’s, tears into him for pursuing other women. (Even though they are exes, Matt and Harriet are so combustible a couple they’d be right at home on Grey’s Anatomy.) There is even a production number that will have viewers humming as they head off to bed.

This is a sensational second installment for a series that opened on an already above-average note with a handsomely produced pilot. It is not to be missed by anyone who enjoys or has questions about television. If this episode doesn’t cement its fan base and generate a second wave of beneficial buzz, no other will.

Contents Copyright 2005 by MediaVillage LLC.



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