Category / Television

by Edward Champion

Chuck Woolery, the Worst Game Show Host of All Time, Has Finally Dropped Dead

Chuck Woolery was a worthless infestation who plagued American television in the 1980s and the 1990s. His death is long overdue.

Chuck Woolery is finally dead and I feel that I can walk into the wintry air with a modicum of relief and a new step in my stride. For Chuck Woolery was an unwanted infestation in American life who kept resurfacing on our television sets in the 1980s and the 1990s like a reptilian huckster kidnapping you, tying you up in his car, and then driving you out into the middle of nowhere to try and sell you on a timeshare. He was a worthless and hateful husk of a man, a slimy and fatuous fascist wind-up doll who couldn’t seem to wipe the solipsistic drool that dribbled down the corners of his Botoxed mouth at all times. He was incapable of curbing the pat aphorisms of intolerance that forever spewed from his asshole-scented mouth on social media. There was never a day in which this gauche gasbag failed to flatulate through his lips. He hated LGBTQIA people. He was unapologetically anti-Semitic. He demeaned liberal women because of the way they looked. And he was an early adopter of the bigotry and xenophobia that now passes for mainstream Republican talking points, announcing in 2012 that Blacks and gays did not require civil rights. Because that was literally all he had to hold onto when the producers eventually came to their senses and said, “Why the fuck did we hire that arrogant prick Woolery? Whose fucking idea was that?” (Sadly, the man who first hired Woolery could not be reached for comment. He has gone into hiding for his own safety and is believed to be living under the Witness Protection Program somewhere in Utah.) This made Woolery a little bit like Hitler — that is, if Hitler’s mediocre postcard painting skills were recognized by the likes of Merv Griffin and Mark Goodson after a high school guidance counselor had informed Adolf Woolery early in his life, “You know, game show host. That tracks.” That he said all these terrible things while resembling nothing less than a barely motile wax museum figure was the rare aesthetic touch proving to be accidentally apposite.

Some of the most honorable Americans I have ever known had always secretly hoped that Chuck Woolery would be beaten to death by a rare coalition of Quakers and Girl Scouts. They hoped that Chuck Woolery could run for his life in a jungle, pursued by hungry tigers who would instantly spot an unrepentant racist and devour him on a pay-per-view stream that all of us would happily pay for. But he was taken out for the good of America when the universe recognized, far later than everybody else had, that Chuck Woolery — who has been risibly described by some media figures as the king of smooth talk — did not have a heart. And so what passed for his heart — and the onyx malice that powered it was potent enough to keep this dubious fascist icon alive for eighty-three years — caved in on itself.

Chuck Woolery will leave no legacy other than “We’ll be back in two and two,” which he thundered at the cameras just before a commercial break in a matter that made William Shatner’s overacting look like light Method touches. And while many slow-minded reactionaries glommed onto this false temporal precision presaging a commercial break as some evidence that Woolery possessed wit and intellect, what they failed to understand was that these words represented a coded cry for help. With “two and two,” Woolery was announcing his IQ and his dick size.

This execrable slab of white male entitlement had one, and only one, skill. It was a completely unremarkable skill seen today in nearly all mediocre men and in nearly every finance bro: to boom and bristle with unfettered 20th century toxic masculinity. This was literally the only job requirement if you wanted to host a game show in the 1980s. There was never a moment on television in which Woolery believed in the great lie of his own importance. Woolery deployed this basic bitch quality to preside over some of the most manipulative game shows ever produced in America (specifically, Love Connection, which caused my mother to drink gallons of White Zinfandel every night when she was single). How much pain Woolery created for the American clime is difficult to calculate, but he almost certainly spawned suicidal ideations with his shotgun-to-mouth appeal in at least 62% of his audience. And it’s especially telling that many of these easily manipulated morons grew up and look back at the trauma of Woolery being on television every goddamned night of the week on some UHF station punching above its weight through the rose-tinted lens of childhood nostalgia.

It goes without saying that the world is better off without Chuck Woolery. Television has been drastically improved now that Chuck Woolery can no longer be tapped to tender us with his narcissistic belief that he was the center of the universe. And, perhaps most importantly, Woolery’s death ensures that he will not be appointed to a new Cabinet position for this monstrous incoming President. Then again, given the belief in conspiracy theories shared among the vast plurality of these nominated goons, I would not be surprised if Woolery’s stiff and desiccated body were to be exhumed only days after the funeral, deposited and propped up into a chair, Weekend at Bernie’s style, somewhere in the West Wing, and installed as the Secretary of Game Shows through a recess appointment. Woolery may be dead, but America may not be done with Woolery.

Rest in piss, Chuck Woolery. You were clearly one of the evil ones. You were such a hideous monster that the equally reactionary Pat Sajak somehow looks classy by comparison.

by Edward Champion

For All Mankind is the Best Show on Television — Why Aren’t You Watching It?

For All Mankind has been criminally overlooked by audiences and the media. It’s time for you folks to get on the bandwagon. This show is too brilliant to be ignored.

Every now and then, television demonstrates that it is capable of rising to the level of great art. Think of the excellent BBC miniseries Our Friends to the North and its sweeping storytelling ambition, which involved following a group of people from Newcastle over the course of thirty-one years. Or the amazing Albuquerque worldbuilding depicted in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. (The latter series, now about to air its final episodes, is so great that it is presently on track to outdoing the predecessor! No small feat, given that Breaking Bad was a masterpiece.) Or pretty much anything that David Simon has written.

But now — with its latest episode “Seven Seconds of Terror” (it dropped today) — I can state with absolute confidence that For All Mankind is the best fucking show on television. Hands down. And I say this as a huge fan of Better Call Saul. Nothing on television matches For All Mankind‘s acting, its narrative reach, and its ballsy and spellbinding storytelling. This is a show that has not only dared to present an alternative universe as a vast and bustling panorama. (In For All Mankind‘s timeline, the Soviets landed on the Moon first.) It has followed a series of utterly fascinating characters over the course of nearly three decades. People we come to care for and are mesmerized by. Earlier this season, the show presented us with a years-long montage of Margo and Sergei getting into an elevator while attending an annual conference. And the “Will they or won’t they?” question that undergirded this dynamic created exquisite and deeply felt sexual tension — one later played out in a hotel room in one of the hottest television scenes I’ve seen in years with the simple question “I would like you to kiss me.” (And this in a show that is primarily about a space race!) For All Mankind introduced a fascinating pre-Elon Musk entrepreneur named Dev Ayesa: a man who wants to use his private money to land the first person on Mars. Where other shows would have presented him as a sinister capitalist, For All Mankind was simply too nimble and fastidious to take such an easy way out. Instead, we see Dev as a man who is inclusive of his employees’ thoughts and opinions. There’s a part of him that actually cares about furthering humanity. But, of course, he’s also a businessman. We see geeks being unapologetically awkward and geeky. We see flawed heroes. Awesome women! Tons of women astronauts! And it’s multicultural! We get Aleida Rosales — a brilliant woman from Mexico who is the daughter of a janitor — and Danielle Poole — who has survived racism and tokenism to become a badass space jockey! But perhaps most important, we see what happens when perceived failures or marginalized types are given another chance. Indeed, the gentle (but by no means hokey) optimism of this show can be compared favorably to Star Trek at its best. And at a time in which the world seems to have become largely hopeless, For All Mankind reminds us of the greatness that humanity is capable of. And it does so without being saccharine about it.

The space travel in this show is not only tremendously exciting, but it’s rightly portrayed as deeply dangerous. And, as such, I have found myself hollering and shouting at the screen every week. I have felt a large and genuine thrill each week that I feel in every bone. During one particularly exciting and jaw-dropping moment a few weeks ago (I dare not spoil it), I gripped the arm of my chair so hard that the side knob on the undercarriage broke and I fell on my ass. But dammit if I didn’t smile and cheer my way through the episode with my newly accrued bruises, thinking absolutely nothing of them!

So, yeah, For All Mankind succeeds at being super-smart and terrifically emotional!

The writers are so consummate and attentive to detail that just about every single historical event has been factored into their plan. When the show jumps forward a decade, we get a zippy montage at the start of what has transpired in the intervening years, one that invites the kind of heavy scrutiny that has been applied to the Zapruder film. (To cite just a few of the historical switcheroos, Ted Kennedy and Gary Hart have been President. John Lennon was never assassinated in this universe. So we see the Beatles getting together for a reunion tour.) The show’s third season even had one of its characters run against Bill Clinton for President and win and it somehow managed to pull this amazing story move with confidence and believability!

Yet this television masterpiece is criminally overlooked by the critics who put together their year-end lists. They have completely ignored this tremendous creative achievement. While everyone has rightly raved over another Apple TV offering (Ted Lasso, which somehow managed to win over a skeptical realist like me), where are the For All Mankind stans? And why aren’t they more ubiquitous? We For All Mankind fans — those of us who have been watching from the very beginning — have to knock on secret doors and knock the rap on speakeasies just to find each other! But why? It is a goddamned crime that For All Mankind is not being talked about everywhere with the same rapturous glee that once accompanied every fresh episode of Mad Men.

The only bad move that this series has made is the clunky Danny/Karen subplot. But even with this fumble, For All Mankind‘s most recent episode indicates that it is about to rectify this mistake.

I believe in this show so enormously that I am not only telling you to watch it. I am ordering you to watch it. Art this great does not happen all that often. If we know each other, I will personally watch the whole damned run from the beginning with you. (Tonight, I made a pledge to do this with one dear friend.)

And to all you dopey television critics who think you’re so fucking intellectual, where the hell are you on this? Why have you stayed silent about For All Mankind? Yeah, I know who you are. I read you. And I’m going to make you a deal right now. If you talk up For All Mankind and you’re a member of the New York media who is on my shit list, I will completely forgive you and sing your praises. I’ll never write a hit piece on you. Because, goddamit, this show is too fucking important and too fucking great for you to sit this one out.

So watch For All Mankind. Start from the beginning and get together with friends. And tell them all that the wacky books guy from Brooklyn sent you.

And if you’re too lazy to read this longass rave, here’s my enthusiasm captured on video:

by Edward Champion

The Rightful End of Roseanne

The end of Roseanne proved that, for now at least, there are limits to American xenophobia expressed through mass entertainment. But the troubling question is whether this is the beginning or the end of network-sanctioned white supremacy.

Roseanne Barr is finished. And it’s about goddam time.

I watched the first few episodes of the Roseanne reboot with an open mind, but the show’s racism and intolerance, well on display within the show and bluntly expressed in Roseanne’s off-air demeanor, demonstrated very conclusively that this was not a contemporary answer to All in the Family, but something more akin to a sitcom version of Jean Raspail’s The Camp of the Saints. An early scene showing the Conners swapping an insufficient supply of medication due to inadequate American healthcare created the illusion that this was a show like its previous iteration, one aligned with the working class roots that had made the original such a success. But then we saw the Conners casually belittling “all the shows about black and Asian families” and it became very clear that this was a program committed to white supremacy. As The New Yorker‘s Emily Nussbaum pointed out, the show relied on coded language, unrealistic dialogue, and sideways jabs to disguise its bigotry-drenched narrative.

I was not the only viewer to flee. It took only weeks for the reboot to drop from 18.44 million viewers to a mere 10.42 million. This was the show that Trump had said “was about us,” but that “us” shed 44% of its purported unity within months. The cast and crew quickly became unsettled by the Faustian bargain they had bought into. Co-showrunner Whitney Cummings left. Then writer Wanda Sykes left. And as actress Emma Kenney was about to bolt, she was informed by her manager that the show was cancelled. The linchpin was a startlingly racist tweet in which Roseanne declared that former Obama aide Valerie Jarrett was the product of “Muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes [sic]” having a baby.

For anybody who had been watching this hatred from the sidelines, Roseanne’s vulgar and vituperative racism was there in the unfettered manner in which she tweeted easily debunked alt-right conspiracy theories as if these hurtful falsehoods represented true gospel. She falsely claimed in March that David Hogg, one of the brave kids who survived the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting and who went on to become a formidable activist, had offered a Nazi salute, despite the fact that Roseanne herself had dressed up as Hitler for Heeb Magazine.

Barring a pickup from an online streaming giant — an unlikely event, given Amazon’s recent woes with Transparent and the Roy Price scandal, Netflix cutting ties with Louis CK, and Hulu likely not wanting to risk its progressive-minded programming slate given the success of The Handmaid’s Tale — there is little chance that Roseanne will return, unless she decides to produce it on her own dime. And even then, she would probably not have enough clout to convince all the cast members and crew to return. Such a hypothetical reboot, untethered from the manacles of network Standards and Practices, would only amp up the atavism further in the interest of “truth-telling,” perhaps inspiring the Southern Poverty Law Center to include Roseanne Barr amidst its distressingly voluminous list of offenders.

This was the first television show cancelled by a single tweet. And I don’t think it will be the last. What Roseanne’s self-immolation demonstrates, quite rightfully and righteously I think, is that America does have limits to what it will tolerate. There will undoubtedly be Daily Caller-reading banshees writing thinkpieces proclaiming this cancellation as a calumny upon the First Amendment. But the decision to write and produce a show, much less watch one, has not been quelled and the audience hungry for this casual xenophobia has regrettably not been deracinated. There are still ten million loyal Roseanne viewers. And I can easily imagine Roseanne being propped up as an underground comic, recast as an alt-right faux Lenny Bruce or perhaps the American answer to Dieudonné, and making a fortune through a monthly Patreon account.

In an age in which a self-help transphobic huckster like Jordan Peterson is framed by the “Paper of Record” as a “dark web intellectual,” Roseanne will probably not be the last repugnant show airing on American television. I fear that we are only at the beginning of hatred and intolerance marketed as “wholesome entertainment.” And while mainstream media rejects Roseanne, one must now be on the lookout for independently produced offerings cut from the same Klan cloth that are snatched up by television executives in the interest of corporate profit. This is, after all, how Roseanne was rebooted in the first place. The question now is who has the chutzpah to push the envelope further into a fetid swamp of ugliness and whether some network desperate for a hit is willing to pick up such a bilious offering, counting upon the American public to forget how these same gatekeepers helped make Roseanne happen in the first place.

by Edward Champion

Mr. Robot’s Surreal Tech Honesty: Why This Could Become the Best Show on TV

Mr. Robot is a thrilling new series that deserves your attention.

Mr. Robot is a veritable referendum on Nic Pizzolatto’s excess and hubris. This is a terrific television series dripping with thrilling depictions of broken and fascinating people that deserves your attention. The show, created by Sam Esmail, is so meticulous in its vision of corporate malfeasance (and those who would exploit the security holes) that it extends its attentions to even the most fleeting of roles, such as the great character actor Tom Ris Farrell as a middle-aged man clutching onto scraps of dignity. Mr. Robot‘s vibrant electronic soundtrack and close verisimilitude of command line moves cements its commitment to the genre of post-cyberpunk, yet the series is even more accomplished in its pursuit of pain and desperation. It has become more poignant and more aware of mortality with each episode.

The show’s heart is steered by Elliot Alderson (played with painstaking fragility by Rami Malek), a techie who works for a security firm called Allsafe. Elliot describes his life through voiceover with dry introspection that could quaver at any minute, one that recalls Edward Norton’s narration in Fight Club. He has an uncertain commitment to revolution, as he dares to fight a two-front war of depression and drug addiction, and an unexamined past populated by demons that he can’t even bring himself to discuss with his therapist. What Elliot does instead is hack into the computers of anyone who enters his life. Elliot’s eyes bulge like an extra terrestrial as he uses credit card items, emails, Twitter accounts, and metadata to piece together these lives on his computer. He burns these details onto discs, labeling each life with an album title. It’s a touching metaphor for the way that an iTunes collection is an insufficient cure for loneliness, yet it doesn’t stop any smartphone addict walking down the street with earbuds perched in her ears.

The show delivers its visuals across an uncanny valley that places subjects to the far edges of the frame. No matter how brilliant our minds or how formidably subcultural our passions, the show’s honest ethos suggests that we can never be the center of any reality. Go the way of normality, whether it be sticking with a putatively loving partner or a commitment to a seemingly respectable firm, and you will find yourself thrown off course by an outside force, whether it be internal corruption, sinister hackers or a creepy Patrick Bateman-like sociopath played with fearsome vivacity by the incredible Martin Wallström. There is an anarchist who goes by the name of Mr. Robot (Christian Slater), who leads a team of hackers that includes a fascinating Iranian Muslim named Mobley who has yet to mention the events of 1979, and hopes to bring the largest corporation in the world (appositely nicknamed “Evil Corp”) to its knees. Mr. Robot is the father figure that Elliot so desperately craves, yet, like most victims, Elliot cannot quite see through Mr.Robot’s violent haze or manipulative motivations. At one point, Mr. Robot pushes Elliot off the edge of a Coney Island railing, leaving him battered for weeks. Of course, Elliot isn’t the only one damaged. There’s Angela Moss, one of Elliot’s coworkers (and a childhood friend), who allowed her philandering boyfriend to install malware on her computer because of his shameless commitment to infidelity. On the more sinister side, there’s Fernando Vera, a drug supplier who first declares to Elliot how his depression is a strength. In the early episodes, I was slightly skeptical with the way that these characters were introduced as cartoonish stock roles. But as the series has gently doled out more character complexity over time, I have come to see these impressions as reflective of Elliot’s view of the universe.

And that’s another quality that’s striking. The show has restyled perfectly safe regions of Manhattan as seedier and more dangerous than they really are, even as it presents authentic drug scenes. Indeed, the show’s commitment to Elliot’s perspective is so liberating and surreal that we see Elliot’s mother force him to eat his pet fish in a fancy restaurant with a design that resembles the Allsafe cubes. Elliot ponders what would happen if people were like webpages. Upon considering whether he can “view source” on others, we see workers sauntering about the corporate office with signs reading I PRETEND TO LOVE MY HUSBAND and I’M EMPTY INSIDE, recalling the subliminal messages in John Carpenter’s They Live.

Some opiners have opted to ascribe a moral imprint upon all this, claiming that Sam Esmail is “playing Sixth Sense-style tricks” on his audience. But this misses the point. Whether “fact” or “fiction,” Elliot’s world is true to his nightmares, even when we witness scenes that he is ostensibly not a part of. And if we know the niceties of Elliot’s shattered existence, maybe we might be tempted to put down our phones and actually talk with the people we judge through social media accounts and shambling about poorly lit cubicles. Perhaps that’s Sam Esmail’s real call for revolution.

by Edward Champion

Vital Facts About Richard Dawson

In an effort to come to terms with the late Richard Dawson’s legacy, we have assembled 14 vital facts (all sourced) about the game show host.

Richard Dawson, host of Family Feud and arguably the osculating Caligula of the late 20th century game show scene, passed away on Saturday in Los Angeles. Here are a number of facts about Richard Dawson, presented to aid others in etching Dawson’s legacy into the grand volume of American history.

1. It is estimated that Richard Dawson kissed about 20,000 women during his run on Family Feud. He regretted nothing. In response to the kissing criticisms, Richard Dawson replied, “I kissed them all for luck and love, that’s all.” (Source: The Associated Press, May 17, 1985)

2. Erma Bombeck offered a more reliable metric for Richard Dawson’s kissing quota. She watched a 30-minute episode of Family Feud, noting that Richard Dawson dispensed 23 kisses. (Source: The Milwaukee Journal, January 18, 1981)

3. Richard Dawson was fearless about contracting disease from kissing all those women. Dawson did not fear mono. He did not fear herpes. He did not fear any disease that stood in his path. “That has never crossed my mind,” said Dawson in 1984. His associate added, “He makes two million a year, and two million buys a lot of salve.” It is unknown if Dawson vigorously washed himself after a hot day of taping. (Source: The Durant Daily Democrat, May 27, 1984)

4. Fran Lebowitz had a lifelong dream to appear on Family Feud. Lebowitz called the show “relaxing…the minute I hear the theme, I perk up.” In 1985, Lebowitz’s agent Mort Janklow received a call from Cathy, Richard Dawson’s husband. The plan was to dedicate the March 4, 1985 episode entirely to Lebowitz, because Lebowitz had said many nice things about the program. Unfortunately, Lebowitz’s mother refused to do it. (Source: The Deseret News, March 8, 1985)

5. Richard Dawson did not shy away from politics. He marched for civil rights in Selma, Alabama and campaigned on behalf of George McGovern. When co-hosting a local television show, he was branded “a far-out liberal.” Yet Dawson remained against Communism, maintaining an unabated faith in Western democracy. As he told an interviewer in 1973: “You tell the midwestern housewife that for the good of the state she’ll have to give up her washing machine and dryer and dishwasher and her electric conveniences and take to scrubbing clothes against a rock in a stream and she will have none of it. No one is going to take away her washing machine, least of all for the good of the state.” When asked about becoming a U.S. citizen, Richard Dawson said that he was felt incapable of assuming the responsibilities of casting a ballot. (He would eventually become an American citizen in 1984.) (Source: The Phoenix, July 20, 1973)

6. ABC once offered Richard Dawson a situation comedy involving two priests in a ghetto. Dawson replied, “There’s a lot of humor there, counseling young girls about abortions and heroin.” The conversation ended quickly and the offer was rescinded. (Source: The Pittsburgh Press, June 4, 1978)

7. Richard Dawson was a night person and felt the happiest when the sun was setting. He would stay up writing or reading, and read about five books a week. It remains unknown whether he practiced vampiric tendencies. (Source: Daytona Beach Morning Journal, August 18, 1979)

8. As a young man in the merchant marine, Richard Dawson started out as a laundry boy and worked his way up to waiter. But this was not enough income for the young strapping Englishman. So he started boxing his mates on ship to bring in some extra cash. But Richard Dawson’s hustling didn’t stop there. When he transferred to the Cunard line, he slipped the maitre’d some cash to make sure he was waiting on the high-tipping tables. (Source: Daytona Beach Morning Journal, August 18, 1979)

9. Dawson nabbed his first role by making up Shakespeare quotes on the spot. (Source: Daytona Beach Morning Journal, August 18, 1979)

10. Dawson also secured employment in London by claiming to be a famous Canadian comic on vacation, looking for a few weeks work. A year later, Dawson was playing the Palladium. (Source: Daytona Beach Morning Journal, August 18, 1979)

11. Richard Dawson had perforated eardrums. (Source: The Phoenix, July 20, 1973)

12. When it came to exercise, Richard Dawson was a real man. In 1966, he went for a brisk 15-minute daily walk. He also managed to get in a swim six days a week in weather foul and fair. (Source: Universal Press Syndicate, July 17, 1966)

13. Richard Dawson spent much of his time shooting pool. In the 1960s, he converted one of his five bedrooms into an antique poolroom, with the table acquired from Tommy Noonan. (Source: Universal Press Syndicate, July 17, 1966)

14. In the early 1980s, TV Guide wished to profile the top six game show hosts in the country. Richard Dawson was not profiled. The reason? He would only agree to an interview if he, and he alone, appeared on the cover. It is unclear whether Richard Dawson continued to make such bold editorial demands for the remainder of his life. (Source: The Leader-Post, February 1, 1985)