October 23rd, 2006

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Television
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Will Studio 60 Get Deep-Sixed?

The first time I saw the trailer for Aaron Sorkin’s new show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, I had misgivings. A TV drama about the behind-the-scenes world of a Saturday Night Live-type variety show? That’s a change of pace from The West Wing.

Except it’s not. In predicting the show’s demise, The Globe and Mail’s Andrew Ryan puts it better than I can:

But it’s too much Sorkin. Everyone on the show talks in great sweeping passages and the exchanges are peppered with cultural references steered toward the hipster demographic. Hey, that guy just said the Drudge Report! And exactly who is Sorkin trying to impress with mentions of Alger Hiss and Pericles?

Studio 60 has double the dialogue of any other network drama, and most of the speechifying takes place while two characters walk briskly through the soundstages of the faux TV show.

The overblown approach worked on The West Wing because Sorkin’s earnest characters really were trying to change the world. You could almost admire these people if they weren’t so fictional. What’s the worst-case scenario awaiting people on Studio 60? Someone flubs a line during the live broadcast? Life would go on.

I’ve enjoyed the show, but I know what he’s talking about. Aaron Sorkin is one of TV’s best writers, but the show’s tone doesn’t match the show’s stakes. It’s a Big Ideas show set at a television studio, and it’s not working.

Which is too bad, because I think Matthew Perry’s doing the best work of his career. I’ve also enjoyed seeing lots of Sarah Paulson and Amanda Peet (I mean to compliment their acting and not just their hotness).

It’ll be a bummer if it gets cancelled, if only because it’s hard to find smart stuff on television.

Comments: 5 Responses so far

Ross
October 24th, 2006
4:25 am

I disagree that it doesn’t work, but concede that it will probably get cancelled for the sake of catering to the lowest common denominator. Perhaps the stakes are no longer as big as creating national policy or staving off international conflict, but the sentiment is the same. Sorkin puts his characters in a popular system that is widely-known to be broken, but that no-one seems to want to fix. The speech by Studio 60’s executive producer Wes Mendell (played by Judd Hirsch) in the pilot episode struck a chord with me. I truly am tired of TV of the type that includes eating worms for money and “Who Wants to Screw My Sister?” I think it’s important that our entertainment isn’t lobotomized. It might not be as crucial as the day-to-day workings of government, but it’s still important enough that it makes for good TV.

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Jeff
October 24th, 2006
6:54 am

Ross - I am sitting at my desk, quietly supressing laughter to the point that my eyes are tearing up - ‘of the type that includes eating worms for money’

Jesus Christ that’s funny. I don’t remember if that’s what Hirsch said in that episode or just your paraphrase, but it is so sadly true.

Darren I totally agree with you. It does not help that Bradley Whitford is in there reinforcing the contrast.

It’s just a TV show, and when they screw up, life goes on. We need only watch SNL to realize how poorly a show can perform, yet still be around for years to come.

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filmgoerjuan
October 24th, 2006
8:25 am

Studio 60 has struck me as an ill-suited cross between Sorkin’s “Sports Night” and “The West Wing”; and it comes off feeling lesser to both previous shows.

I want to like it (and in a way I do like it, for all the Sorkin-y goodness) but the concept behind the show is making me go “who really cares?” than involving me in the drama of these characters’ lives.

I’m sure that if it gets pulled, I’ll miss it when it’s gone.

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crunchy carpets
October 24th, 2006
11:52 am

I wanted to like the show…but I feel it tries to hard for what it is.

I keep feeling (especially last night) that he was really trying to prove to me how GREAT working for network tv is and with all the history of tv and all that it was like HE was comparing it to oh say, working at the White House.

I think the Acting IS great.

But they don’t have enough to work with…it is too ‘fake’…I don’t buy it.

I bought it with the West Wing…this is like some Disney version of network television.

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JohnB
October 25th, 2006
12:30 pm

Thank you, filmgoerjuan! I should have realized that Sports Night was from Sorkin’s pen. The series came and went far, far too quickly.

Interesting sidelight: my wife couldn’t stand WW but, though not a sports fan, would NOT miss a Sports Night episode.

I think that those who feel, like Ross, that the “stakes are not there” have nailed it. I had a previously inchoate unease about watching/missing the show. Now I know why I felt that way. Thanks, Ross, for putting it that way.

I give it a short run for that reason and several others. The biggest problem is that (and this is ironic given the show’s plotline) it’s a narrowcast more suited to even edgier writing that would be perfect for a niche cable channel. If the writing and plots go that way then they’ll lose the wasteland of the American audience — but they’ll create television that is brilliant and memorable. If the writing and plots don’t go that way then they’ll keep the middle America audience (white bread and all) — and they’ll create television that’s as memorable as … damn! what was the name of that show? you know, with the two guys … brothers? … and every week something happened.

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