Mid-season brings a flood of debuts and season-openers

So now we know what we might be doing during a long, cold winter.
We can stare at our TV sets, catching lots of shows that are new or semi-new or, at least, re-arranged.
This week, ABC, NBC and Fox announced their mid-season plans. Combined, in January and February they’ll have five new drama series (two of them about missing-persons units), three new comedies (including “Not Dead Yet,” shown here with Gina Rodriguez), three new reality shows and about a dozen season-openers, plus some shows changing nights. Read more…

Best-bets for Nov.10: Farewell to a weird gem

1) “Atlanta” series-finale, 10 p.m., FX, rerunning at 10:47 and 11:34. One of TV’s best (if weirdest) shows ends its four-season run. It has already won six Emmys and been nominated for 19 more, including two for best comedy series. Donald Glover (shown here, right, in a previous episode) has been nominated three times as best actor and twice as director (winning once in each category), plus twice for his scripts. The finale’s title – not serious, we hope – is, “It Was Only a Dream.” Read more…

Best-bets for Nov. 9: country, “Crown,” classics

1) CMA Awards, 8-11 p.m., ABC. Generations and genres merge. This opens with a tribute to the late Loretta Lynn and later has a career award for Alan Jackson. It has music fron Reba McEntire and Patty Loveless, plus crossover artists (Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson, Pillbox Patti, the Black Keys) and current country elite — Miranda Lambert (shown here), Carrie Underwood, Luke Bryan, Carly Pearce, Lainey Wilson, Jimmy Allen, Kelsea Ballerini, Luke Combs and more. Read more…

Best-bets for Nov. 8: elections, plus a few alternatives

1) Election coverage. The stakes are huge today — 36 governors, 34 senators and all 435 congressmen, plus control of the House and Senate. So the networks are going all-out: ABC, CBS (shown here with Norah O’Donnell), NBC and PBS start coverage at 8 p.m. ET, when many polls close. Pausing briefly (including 11 p.m.) for local coverage, they’ll be ready to go all night. So will the news networks. Read more…

Best-bets for Nov. 7: After a brief break, dramas return

1) “The Cleaning Lady,” 9:02 p.m., Fox. After a one-week baseball break, the show booms back with a tough and involving hour (shown here) — a strong one for Oliver Hudson (right). Once a comedy actor like his mom (Goldie Hawn) and sister (Kate Hudson), he’s excellent as Garrett, an FBI guy facing tragedy (shown here) while trying to bring down the evil Kamdar, despite distractions: He’s hiding the fact that he killed Cortez; Thony’s hiding the fact that it was her nephew who pushed her husband to his death. Read more…

Jordan brought an impish charm to TV

(Finding Leslie Jordan’s final TV work on Fox has been a bit tricky. His “Call Me Kat” episode, on Nov. 3, was bumped by the World Series; so was his visit to “The Masked Singer” on Nov. 2. The latter was rescheduled for 8 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 6 … but will be bumped again, if the Series goes to seven games. Meanwhile, here’s the story I wrote after Jordan died in a car accident.)  
When Leslie Jordan first got there, Hollywood knew what a star should look like.
That was 40 years ago, when TV was dominated by Tom Selleck and Selleck types. A star would be 6-foot-4, handsome, a lades man, with a Midwestern-type voice.
And Jordan (shown here), who died Monday (Oct. 24) at 67, was the exact opposite. He was 4-foot-11, gay, with an impish charm and a pronounced Tennessee accent. “I realized that my job was the funny guy that comes in with the zingers,” he told the Television Critics Association in 2018. Read more…

A tenacious writer-singer-actress breaks through

Sasha Clayton and Nicole Lecky have a lot in common, actually.
Both are blessed with beauty and musical talent. But both grew up in London’s hard-scrabble East End, with no easy way to get into show business.
From there, they diverge wildly. Sasha is fictional, the central character in “Mood,” a six-part mini-series (with music) on AMC+ and BBC America. In the opener (10 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 6), she lashes out fiercely at … well, everyone; her world implodes.
And Lecky (shown here) is real. She stars, sings, wrote the scripts, overcame the things that shattered Sasha. “It was a mixture of, I guess, talent and tenacity,” she told the Television Critics Association. Read more…

Successful TV co-star? It’s a mixed pleasure

Here are some moments in the life of a successful TV actor. Jim Hoffmaster (shown here) was:
1) Visiting his high school alma mater in Durand, Mich., when a young woman rushed in, grinning. She was meeting the guy who played Kermit on “Shameless” – “my favorite character on my favorite show.” Later, he was cheered at a street fair in Lansing, Mich.; it was, he said, “the closest I’ve ever been to being mobbed.”
2) Back home in Los Angeles, in his crowded studio apartment. No, he doesn’t have elegant dinner parties there. In fact, he never has guests … and he sometimes eats soup straight from the can.
Those scenes are in “Acting Like Nothing is Wrong,” a documentary now reaching film festivals (including the East Lansing Film Festival on Nov. 10). The contrasts — a vivid view of the life of a supporting actor — will surprise viewers … as they surprised the filmmaker. “He warned me what his apartment was like,” Jane Rosemont said, “but it was still a bit of a shock.” Read more…

Best-bets for Nov. 6: moody music visit to stars and wannabes

1) “Spector” opener, 9 p.m., Showtime. Phil Spector was the master of early-’60s pop music, churning out vibrant “wall of sound” hits for the Ronettes (shown here) and others. Then he sort of disappeared … until Feb. 3, 2003. That’s when a British magazine published a long, candid interview; it’s also when a blonde beauty was found dead in his mansion. This compelling, four-week film starts that day, then uses the interview as the spine; the opeer focuses on a great (but brief) career. Read more…