CHICAGO – Excelsior! Comic book legend Stan Lee’s famous exclamation puts a fine point on the third and final play of Mark Pracht’s FOUR COLOR TRILOGY, “The House of Ideas,” presented by and staged at City Lit Theater in Chicago’s Edgewater neighborhood. For tickets/details, click HOUSE OF IDEAS.
The 10 Biggest Emmy Snubs of 2010
5. Regina King of “Southland”
Regina King
Photo credit: TNT
“Southland” is slowly building a following after its unceremonious dumping from NBC and subsequent pick-up by TNT. This is one of the richest ensembles on television and Regina King gives one of the tube’s most consistent performances. She anchors some of the more complex plotlines of the program in believable human emotions. As Detective Lydia Adams, King displays a perfect combination of human vulnerability and the veins of steel required to be an L.A. cop. Much was made about the fact that the Academy nominated “The Tonight Show With Conan O’Brien” instead of the one with Jay Leno as it displayed something of a cold shoulder to the man who created such drama in the late night TV wars. It would have been even more of a middle finger to the peacock network to nominate the deserving King for Lead or Supporting Actress from a show that NBC dumped to make room for the Leno debacle. I suggested last year — thinking that the show would be on NBC for a whole season — that Mariska Hargitay better make room for King. The tumultuous second season made that less likely but if the show continues to rise on TNT in 2010-11, someone is going to have to get out of the way.
4. Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic for “Castle”
Castle
Photo credit: ABC
Fillion and Katic have the most entertaining chemistry on television, reminding viewers of the right age of Dave and Maddie from “Moonlighting” or whatever other great will-they-or-won’t-they pair from TV history. They simply get better at what they do with every episode and the fact is that what they do isn’t nearly as easy as it looks. What they’re accomplishing is often written off as fluff entertainment but keeping viewers interested in both the case-of-the-week and the arc of the characters solving it takes more acting skill than the Academy was apparently willing to recognize this year. It took four seasons for them to realize that Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton, another great TV team, deserved to have their inaugural nominations at the same time. Perhaps it will take a couple more for Nate and Stana.
3. “Community”
Joel McHale in Community
Photo credit: NBC
The Academy wisely recognized a wave of new shows this year — “The Good Wife,” “Glee,” “Modern Family,” “Nurse Jackie.” You’d think that one of the smartest comedies on television with one of the strongest ensembles would have netted a single, lonely nomination, but “Community” was left completely off the list. Even “Rules of Engagement” got ONE nomination (Art Direction). And “Community” deserved consideration “above the line” in major acting categories. The season started a little shakily but McHale and his ensemble were simply spectacular by the end of the year. Anyone would have been nice, but we would have found a spot for McHale (over Matthew Morrison), Pudi (over Jon Cryer), and Brie (over Jane Krakowski). Sometimes it takes a year or two for a show to catch fire with the Academy. If “Community” continues its upward trajectory in quality, expect at least two of these three to be nominated next summer.
2. Anna Paquin and Alexander Skarsgard for “True Blood”
Alexander Skarsgard in True Blood
Photo credit: HBO
It’s another year with no acting nominations for “True Blood,” which wouldn’t be quite as surprising if the show hadn’t been nominated for Outstanding Dramatic Series. It’s one of the six best dramas on television, but not a SINGLE cast member are among the best? Does that make sense? The fact is that the second season of “True Blood” would not have been Best Drama-worthy without the performances from Anna Paquin and Alexander Skarsgard and they deserved nominations recognizing that. Their snubbing makes it seem pretty likely that “Blood” was the sixth nominee, one that barely snuck in to fill out the category. Don’t expect that the show has any chance of actually winning.
1. “Justified”
Timothy Olyphant in Justified
Photo credit: FX
It’s shameful that the Academy didn’t nominate FX’s great “Justified” in more categories and there’s no greater shame than their complete dismissal of the career-best work by Timothy Olyphant as Raylan Givens. Distilling his work on “Deadwood” into a modern-day cowboy, Olyphant is brilliant in every scene of the first season of this great show, one of the most critically acclaimed of 2010. It feels like “Justified” doesn’t fit into a box like other nomination-friendly shows and the Academy probably undervalued the program due to a lack of melodrama. Hard-to-classify programs like “Glee” and “The Good Wife” were embraced but Olyphant didn’t get his invite to the party. It better happen next year or Raylan might have to kick some ass.
By BRIAN TALLERICO |
At least Steve Carell is in...
Steve Carell is on fire! His movies are making money and are consistently good. Is there any other comedy actor that can say that right now? Hit TV show, two major movies in July, and it keeps going and going.
Top 4 Steve Carell movies:
http://www.digitallizardproductions.com/daily-fournication-07.12.10—top…
How can you argue with his track record?
Where is Nestor Carbonell
Where is Nestor Carbonell (Richard Alpert in Lost)???
Wasn’t he one of the Biggest Emmy Snubs of 2010???
Characters from Lost
… can get lost. I stopped watching when they started bringing all the weirdos on board. I watched to see what happened to the characters from the original plane crash, when they stopped focussing on them I lost interest, Maybe they should have nominated Nestor’s eyes for outstanding character in a _____. They took over every scene he was in.
It was so much more than his
It was so much more than his eyes, I forgot all about his eyes (and they’re not easy to forget! :D) Carbonell gave a brilliant, heartbreaking performace in Richard-centric “Ab aeterno”, worthy of a win, not just a nomination.
Not "Justified"
…. and Raylan Givens would be Justified in kicking ***. After becoming a fan of TO this season I have watched almost everything he has done from unknown appearances like Sarah Jessica Parker’s pickup in Sex and the City to Live Free Die Hard. He has grown as an actor and has the ability to totally pull you into the storyline. The last scene in Justified episode 13 where he points the gun at Walton Goggins and makes the noise of it shooting gives so much insight the relationship. At the start of the series we thought the marshall was trigger happy, turns out he only shoots when necessary.
Love the show, love Timothy!!
What about parenthood?! that
What about parenthood?! that entire cast is great and yet, no nominations?! seriously?! urgh
Justified - best new show of 2010
DH and I rarely love the same show because we have differing tastes, but we have watched every single episode of Justified and we considered it the best show this year. The colorful characters, the spicy yet insightful dialogue, the deceptively simple plot, the ensemble cast, in this Elmore Leonardesque saga, everything was top notch and delectable like sipping a tall cool southern drink with a hot side of chicken wings. There was humor, there was sex, there was love, blood and gore, there was human frailty and family betrayal and blood loyalty, there was falling and redemption, Boo to the Emmy for snubbing this show!
The fall 2009 and spring
The fall 2009 and spring 2010 seasons of “The Amazing Race” were two of the worst seasons.