—Once you miss the first episode of a TV drama with a series long storyline it’s easy to feel SOL. So after missing the first episode of the Fox network series “Empire” catching up became problematic.
I’ll have to wait until the series repeats or is available OnDemand. (To watch episodes on the Fox website you must use a “TV provider” ID and password). Update: According to The Hollywood Reporter the first season will be available for streaming on Hulu Plus.
One of the writers of the hit series about the music industry, which stars Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson, is Eric Haywood, a Milwaukee native, Custer High School graduate and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee film school alum.
“Empire” had its season finale on Wednesday. Watch WITI-TV (Channel 6) reporter Justin Williams interview with Haywood here.
And you can follow Haywood, who was also a writer on “Soul Food,” the series based on the movie by Milwaukee native George Tillman Jr., on Twitter
–-Before “Empire” there was John Ridley’s “Platinum” series, also set in the music industry.
In a story in Thursday’s New York Times Ridley – Mequon native, Oscar-winning screenwriter and creator of ABC’s “American Crime” – talks about creating the 2003 series which ran on UPN for six episodes. Ridley says he was contacted by Francis Ford Coppola, of all people, who said his daughter Sofia Coppola wanted to create a series in the world of hip hop.
By the time the series went into production Sofia Coppola was directing “Lost in Translation” leaving Ridley “alone in Toronto trying to put this TV show together.”
Additionally: “I really wanted to shoot little films. I did not want to shoot traditional television.”
That “Platinum,” whose original title was “Empire” is not on DVD or any streaming service is “one of the ongoing pains of my life,” Ridley said.
–Norm Macdonald may be one of the less well-known “Saturday Night Live” performers but he remains one of the funniest as he proved again Wednesday night on “Late Night with David Letterman.” Watch a clip from the show below.
It’s a delight to see Letterman actually enjoy a conversation with a guest and no one can crack him up like Macdonald. One of his frequent topics is Milwaukee Brewers announcer Bob Uecker, whom he calls “a pal” and the “funniest man in the world. And he talks dirty. Swears all the time.”
He first met Uecker in Arizona at a spring training game where Uecker regaled him with stories about working with Christopher Hewett on “Mr. Belvedere.”
“I’ll tell you something about Belevedere you may not know,” begins one anecdote which ends “You gotta stop feedin’ Belvedere mozzarella.”
Another long story involves “a wistful moment” golfing with Uecker who, after realizing “he hadn’t sworn in a while” breaks drops a few F bombs. That the obscenities are pretty well scrubbed out of the clip – the Uecker anecdotes start at 1:31 – almost makes it funnier. Macdonald, incidentally, provided a revealing backstage tweet by tweet commentary of the recent “SNL” reunion,
—Finally did you know Agent Phil Coulson, played by Clark Gregg on the ABC series “Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D,” is a Cheesehead? You would know, if you had read this.
Tags: American Crime, Bob Uecker, Empire, Eric Haywood, George Tillman Jr., Letterman, Macdonald, Ridley, WITI Posted by