Stories

Stories

Valerie Harper: Some fun memories coming

Memories of Valerie Harper – fun ones, funny ones – will reach digital TV over the next few days.
The reruns are from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and “Rhoda,” Both shows seemed to share the upbeat approach of Harper, who died Friday (Aug. 30) at 80.
“I had a very positive mom,” she said in 2014, adding: “I’ve always thought that life is here to have fun and to meet people …. But this really brings you up short, when you hear that you have limited time.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / September 4, 2019
Stories

TV wrestling starts a rowdy new era

A generation ago, Teal Piper (shown here) recalls, wrestling didn’t seem like an equal-opportunity workplace.
“Women were really accessories to the men,” she said. They were there for sex appeal.
She once expressed that opinion to her father – possibly in a snarky, teenager way. “He just let me have it.” He slammed his fist, broke the table, and lectured that women work twice as hard.
It should be mentioned that her dad, the late wrestling star Rowdy Roddy Piper, had table-thumping strength plus social consciousness. “He had three daughters and he was a feminist at heart.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / September 2, 2019
Stories

Wu-Tang: Urban sound, built on Carolina dreams

By the time he was a teenager, Rza would be immersed in New York’s hip-hop scene.
He would eventually be linked with Method Man and Ghostface Killah and Ol’ Dirty Bastard and more. He would create Wu-Tang Clan (shown here), the powerhouse group depicted in a new Hulu series
.But some of the first poetry he heard wasn’t rap … and he wasn’t in New York … and he wasn’t Rza. He was Bobby Diggs, living in North Carolina and listening to his uncle.“
He spoke in song, nursery rhymes all day,” Rza said. “Or old folk tales.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / September 1, 2019
Stories

“Mayans” lures all outsiders … even non-violent ones

Few of us have ever been in a Latino motorcycle club, it seems.
Fewer have shot a person, much less dismembered one. Even fewer have killed with our bare hands.
Then why is it that we easily relate to “Mayans M.C.,” which starts its second season Tuesday?
It’s all about “the things we didn’t get,” said Kurt Sutter, the show’s co-creator, “whether it’s love, camaraderie or brotherhood or justice.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 30, 2019
Stories

Bluegrass: A regional sound goes global

This was supposed to be regional music, rural music. Then bluegrass spread way beyond that.
“Big Family” — the new PBS film on Friday, Aug. 30 — starts by quoting Bill Monroe, a pioneer of the sound: “Bluegrass has brought more people together and made more friends than any other music in the world.”
Then it shows that impact. We hear Monroe’s “Blue Moon of Kentucky” on his own 1947 record .. and on the flip side of Elvis Presley’s first record in 1954 … and from a modern Japanese group.
Yes, Japan likes bluegrass. “They treated us like the Beatles,” says Jeff Hanna of the Nitty Gritty Dirty Band. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 28, 2019
Stories

Binge shows are ready to seize our holiday weekend

In the low-tech, no-tech days, people did odd things over the Labor Day weekend.
They swam or had picnics or talked to family and friends. It was a strange time
.And this coming weekend? They’re supposed to binge-watch something.
Four streaming services release big projects Friday, aimed at bingers Two are opposites – a feel-good, frontier story and an intense modern crime tale. The other two are fantasy tales; the four are: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 27, 2019
Stories

On becoming desperate in Orlando, Florida

Mel Rodriguez – or what’s left of him – was discussing two important subjects.
Both are key to the Kirsten Dunst series (“On Becoming a God in Central Florida,” shown here) he co-stars in. And both have places in his life. They are:
— Multi-level, from-home marketing schemes. “My mother was in Grand Rapids, Mich., where Amway started,” he said. “She almost got into it and regrets the day that she didn’t, because she would have been really wealthy now.”
— Florida. “I’m from Florida and there’s a real hopelessness in places like Ocala and Gainesville. These are people living from paycheck to paycheck, (hoping) they can maybe not get their lights turned off.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 20, 2019
Stories

An “impatient” photographer finds Arctic warmth, beauty

Ronan Donovan has spend large chunks of his life waiting – for the perfect shot, the perfect moment.
He spent three months among white wolves in the Arctic, for an epic documentary (shown here) that debuts Sunday (Aug. 25).
He spent a year in Yellowstone, filming gray wolves.“People think that I’m like the most patient human,” he said. “I’m incredibly impatient. I’m very stubborn and very obsessive in my projects, and that’s what drives me.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 19, 2019
Stories

Striking a fresh “Pose,” Porter soars

For many actors, 50 is somewhere near the end zone. It’s time to play dads and angry desk sergeants.
And for Billy Porter? “I’m having a fabulous time,” he said.
He already has a Tony and a Grammy; he could add an Emmy on Sept. 22 … the day after he turns 50.
That’s in “Pose,” which has given him fresh opportunities. On the season finale (Tuesday), he said, he’ll get a new love interest; two weeks earlier, he had his first nude scene. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / August 16, 2019