Studio 60

I could hear the quips, fast dialogue even before I turned on my television. I knew there'd be a fleet of witty actors, at least one strong female character, who might even run everything. Lots of walking, repetition, speechifying. The biggest draw was Matthew Perry whose comedic timing often makes soft drinks come out of my nose. In fact, the cast of Studio 60 is impressive, beginning with Judd Hirsch whose Network-esque I'm-sick-and-tired-and-I'm-not-going-to-take-it-anymore speech made for an effective inciting incident. Gee, is Aaron Sorkin trying to tell us something about television? We should care, dammit, the way we do about our country. And being creative makes genius writers take drugs--Vicadin and cocaine. Not just one drug, two. I understand there have to be allusions to Chris Farley and John Belushi. Perhaps, someone can shoot a dog next.

Unlike The West Wing, the stakes of this show aren't high enough. I don't care about these wealthy, smart people striving to make a television show work--the way I did about the wealthy, smart people running a country. We've seen the ebbs and flows of comedic talent on Saturday Night Live, but are we on the edge of our seats to see if Tina Fey has a job tomorrow? Oh wait, she's doing a show about this same topic.

Of course, I will keep watching Studio 60, if only to see Matthew Perry slip into Chandler Bing-isms ("Rock, hard place...me"). Then there's the morbid curiosity of whether Steven Weber will sleep with the Amanda Peet character; maybe the Christian ex-girlfriend [not sure I buy this] will convert to Voodooism and stab dolls. Also, I'm waiting for the characters to be funny since they're part of a sketch comedy show. My greatest hope of all is for Sorkin to remove the earnestness of these characters and boost the sleaze factor. I would be completely on board then.
ps. Very happy the cast of Thirty-Something is working this fall, except I don't see Ken Olin but he's so good as the evil-doer on Lifetime (television for women) movies.