Ugliest cast on network TV?
Unhurried1
beat', pertaining to glamorous female cops on TV:
"It's TV and you are serving a bunch of different masters,
and none of them is reality," said David Simon, journalist,
TV producer and author of the book that served as the basis
for NBC's classic 1990s cop show Homicide: Life on the
Street.
"We used to say with pride on the first season of Homicide
that we had the ugliest cast on network TV," Simon said.
But as the show struggled in the ratings, there was network
pressure to add more sex appeal. What began in 1993 with a
lone female in the squad room -- the gritty, unglamorous
Detective Kay Howard (Melissa Leo) -- ended with a coterie
of female cops, including ex-beauty queen Detective Rene
Sheppard (Michael Michele).
"If you look at the one female detective we had, it also
reflected there aren't a great deal of female police
officers," Simon said. But as the show lived on "you had to
appease the network gods, and the way you did that was say
'All right, we'll bring on another female detective.'"
....................
In my view the 'ugly' quotient in season one would compare
with that of, say, Seinfeld, or early L&O, or The Practice
today. I think the concept at issue is not whether certain
individual actors or complete casts are attractive or
glamorous, but rather the validity of the network suits'
perception and conviction that the mass audience demands
that most of their stars be hunks and babes, and that if a
show is ailing, that an injection of sex appeal will
provide a cure. I don't believe the audience does demand
that. The characters in a successful show don't lack
appeal, certainly, but what creates that appeal goes far
beyond physical appearance and sexual attraction. I
acknowledge the success of Baywatch, and the WWF, but these
can't be compared with the shows named above -- the apples
and oranges are too extremely different. Myself, I'm not
going to watch a police show just because the actors are
entirely gorgeous -- but then, nor did I when I was
younger. On the other hand, credibility is not strained if
the actors happen to be attractive. For me, success or
failure of a show depends on a variety of factors, but the
glamor/ugliness quotient is insignificant, and I suspect
it's much the same for a lot of viewers. The network
neanderthals, of course, are stuck in their rut.
http://member.aol.com/hlotslinks/
* Sent from AltaVista http://www.altavista.com Where you can also find related Web Pages, Images, Audios, Videos, News, and Shopping. Smart is Beautiful
Katy IJL
Braugher, Daniel Baldwin, and Reed Diamond are all good looking. Melissa Leo is
pretty, I mean, what show doesn't have ugly people?
Falsone is just an ugly piece of chien-merd.
Law & Order's cast is decent looking, except I have a problem with one of the
cast members looks.
SVU had a hot cast before they got rid of my boyfriend, Cassidy (go away
Luna!).
Katy
-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
"I'm the queen of my own f******* universe."
"Nobody's perfect . . . . in the grand scheme of things I am nobody . . .
therfore, I am perfect."
Remove -crapola to reply
-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
Luna
>SVU had a hot cast before they got rid of my boyfriend, Cassidy (go away
>Luna!).
I'm lying in wait. Mwahahahaha!
I *am* Mrs. Stabler; that dishwater blonde just plays me on TV.
And I think it's pretty weak to define H:LotS' cast as "ugly" because they
didn't have a Michael Michelle or an Angie Harmon around in their first season.
Try "human."
realistically, luna
* "Just at present you only see the tree by the light of the lamp. I
wonder when you would ever see the lamp by the light of the tree."
--
"The world shall be cleansed with ice and floods, and I'll thank
you to keep to your own shelf in the refrigerator."
TVFan87656
>In my view the 'ugly' quotient in season one would compare
>with that of, say, Seinfeld, or early L&O, or The Practice
>today.
"The Practice" is all about hiring beautiful women with no talent. Why else
would Lara Flynn Boyle get a job? She can't act, she never could. Kelli
Williams is also no great thespian. They were probably hired specifically for
beauty, and to be the leading ladies in Bobby Donnell's revolving bed.
There are no ugly people in the cast of "The Practice", except Jimmy. Even he
isn't ugly, he's that type of unattractive where people tell him he's a teddy
bear. I don't see how anything on this show, including physical beauty, could
ever be compared to season 1 of Homicide.
morpheus
Unhurried1 wrote:
>
> From an article at the Links titled 'Grit, glitz on the
> beat', pertaining to glamorous female cops on TV:
>
> "It's TV and you are serving a bunch of different masters,
> and none of them is reality," said David Simon, journalist,
> TV producer and author of the book that served as the basis
> for NBC's classic 1990s cop show Homicide: Life on the
> Street.
>
> "We used to say with pride on the first season of Homicide
> that we had the ugliest cast on network TV," Simon said.
> But as the show struggled in the ratings, there was network
> pressure to add more sex appeal. What began in 1993 with a
> lone female in the squad room -- the gritty, unglamorous
> Detective Kay Howard (Melissa Leo) -- ended with a coterie
> of female cops, including ex-beauty queen Detective Rene
> Sheppard (Michael Michele).
>
> "If you look at the one female detective we had, it also
> reflected there aren't a great deal of female police
> officers," Simon said. But as the show lived on "you had to
> appease the network gods, and the way you did that was say
> 'All right, we'll bring on another female detective.'"
>
> ....................
>
> In my view the 'ugly' quotient in season one would compare
> with that of, say, Seinfeld, or early L&O, or The Practice
> today. I think the concept at issue is not whether certain
> individual actors or complete casts are attractive or
> glamorous, but rather the validity of the network suits'
> perception and conviction that the mass audience demands
> that most of their stars be hunks and babes, and that if a
> show is ailing, that an injection of sex appeal will
> provide a cure. I don't believe the audience does demand
> that. The characters in a successful show don't lack
> appeal, certainly, but what creates that appeal goes far
> beyond physical appearance and sexual attraction. I
> acknowledge the success of Baywatch, and the WWF, but these
> can't be compared with the shows named above -- the apples
> and oranges are too extremely different. Myself, I'm not
> going to watch a police show just because the actors are
> entirely gorgeous -- but then, nor did I when I was
> younger. On the other hand, credibility is not strained if
> the actors happen to be attractive. For me, success or
> failure of a show depends on a variety of factors, but the
> glamor/ugliness quotient is insignificant, and I suspect
> it's much the same for a lot of viewers. The network
> neanderthals, of course, are stuck in their rut.
>
I will unashamedly admit true love for rushless...
When Networks can tell people what's attractive, they get to put that on
screen. Sipowitz' ass wouldn't be cool if it didn't sell madison avenue.
If advertisers don't like network tv, they change it. Networks are
slaves to advertising, end of story.
it'll happen to cable tv too, just wait....won't be but 5 or less years
now.....
morph- doesn't recognize linear time, and still hopes Zeus has planned
better programming for the linear future......
Karing21
>Falsone is just an ugly piece of chien-merd.
Glad to see the French lessons are paying off. Just like Frank, you're
bilingual.
Karin,
thinking dogs everywhere (especially French Poodles) will be insulted by Katy's
quip....probably her intention all along
Pushkin
> The Homicide people weren't ugly, until Falsone came. Kyle Secor, Andre
> Braugher, Daniel Baldwin, and Reed Diamond are all good looking. Melissa
Leo is
> pretty, I mean, what show doesn't have ugly people?
Well it's all personnal opinion wether they look good or not but it wasn't
flashed in our faces all the time either. They downsized the importance of
the looks. Like when Diamond came on, they showed us he was a good actor. I
think there lies the difference, not so much as absolutely choosing what
you'd qualify as "ugly".
Sacha
Pushkin
> >Falsone is just an ugly piece of chien-merd.
>
> Glad to see the French lessons are paying off. Just like Frank, you're
> bilingual.
>
hmm. *will restrain himself from commenting* :)
Sacha
Katy IJL
>Glad to see the French lessons are paying off. Just like Frank, you're
>bilingual.
Yo soy bilingual, pero no hablo Frances. Yo hablo un poco Aleman, Italiano,
Frances y um Hebrew. Y Yiddish.
>thinking dogs everywhere (especially French Poodles) will be insulted by
>Katy's
>quip....probably her intention all along
>
>
No, I like dogs.
No, I did not mean Falsone.
Pamela Rose
>
> From an article at the Links titled 'Grit, glitz on the
> beat', pertaining to glamorous female cops on TV:
>
> "It's TV and you are serving a bunch of different masters,
> and none of them is reality," said David Simon, journalist,
> TV producer and author of the book that served as the basis
> for NBC's classic 1990s cop show Homicide: Life on the
> Street.
>
> "We used to say with pride on the first season of Homicide
> that we had the ugliest cast on network TV," Simon said.
> But as the show struggled in the ratings, there was network
> pressure to add more sex appeal. What began in 1993 with a
> lone female in the squad room -- the gritty, unglamorous
> Detective Kay Howard (Melissa Leo) -- ended with a coterie
> of female cops, including ex-beauty queen Detective Rene
> Sheppard (Michael Michele).
Ugly equals real, I guess. The first few seasons of Homicide had
amazingly real looking people. It seems to only be American t.v. that
has a problem with that and they equate real with "ugly". British t.v.
and Canadian t.v. have characters that look like real people and it's
not a big deal, but if a couple of characters from NYPD Blue or The
Practice make good, their acting ability is ignored because of their
weight or looks. When they remade "Cracker" in the U.S., they wouldn't
dare have a man like Robbie Coltrane reprise the part. We're far too
picky to accept anyone that far out of the balance. But they ignored
that it was never his looks that made Cracker attractive, it was his
smarts--and they managed to water that down.
Homicide wasn't popular because it was a "smart" show. That's never
going to be a blockbuster on American t.v. Why should it be when people
are tuning into crap like "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire"? Greed trumps
quality. Flash trumps quality.
My question is why a decent number of viewers for something good never
win out over crap? Shouldn't there come a time when profit is not the
ONLY thing? I'm not saying they shouldn't make money--of course they
should make money. But why should it always be MORE money? As a
shareholder, I'd be happier with a few bucks less profit and more
thought behind the product.
--
Pamela
Trinity998
Ugly? Are they nuts? I thought H:LOTS was one of the BEST looking casts around.
Of course, my standards of beauty include BRAINS as well as GOOD LOOKS. In my
eyes, these guys had both.
"I'm a homicidal maniac. They look just like everyone else."
-Wednesday Addams (The Addams Family Movie)
BobKinDC
exactly "pure" as the butt-ugliest cast in TV.
------------------
--Bob Kennedy Alexandria, VA
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Yvaine4
>"The Practice" is all about hiring beautiful women with no talent. Why else
>would Lara Flynn Boyle get a job? She can't act, she never could. Kelli
>Williams is also no great thespian. They were probably hired specifically for
>beauty, and to be the leading ladies in Bobby Donnell's revolving bed.
Thank you! Boyle and Williams are the reasons why I quit the show. I assumed
that most people thought they brought more depth and angst to The Practice. Or
were somehow good for the show or they would've been fired. At least, I hope
they would be.
Keith Gow
waxed lyrical:
>Unhurried1 wrote:
>>
>> From an article at the Links titled 'Grit, glitz on the
>> beat', pertaining to glamorous female cops on TV:
>>
>> "It's TV and you are serving a bunch of different masters,
>> and none of them is reality," said David Simon, journalist,
>> TV producer and author of the book that served as the basis
>> for NBC's classic 1990s cop show Homicide: Life on the
>> Street.
>>
>> "We used to say with pride on the first season of Homicide
Pamela, welcome back. You've just said everything that needed to be
said here. My work here is (already) done.
|| Keith Gow ||
Brad: [reading Lester's job description] "My job requires
mostly masking my contempt for the assholes in charge,
and, at least once a day, retiring to the men's room so I can
jerk off while I fantasize about a life that doesn't so closely
resemble Hell." - "American Beauty"
Barbara Holley
BACK THE OTHER GUY THEY HAD INTEAD OF REPLACING HIM WITH SOMEBODY ELSE.
Shelshka
I don't remember any of the male characters dating someone named Ted.
You need to be more specific, Barbara. Many L&O cast members have
come and gone.
--
Shel
RCB.