Tuesday, 26 November 2024

Register

Arts & Life

Posted On


TV CORNER: GET SHORTY ON EPIX

Cable channel EPIX is relatively new to the business of original programming, but they may be getting the hang of coming up with decent product.

The second season of “Berlin Station” and “Graves” is soon to come but, meanwhile, the third entry is happening now.

The new 10-episode series has a familiar name in “Get Shorty,” given its pedigree of being “based in part on the novel by Elmore Leonard.”

The semantics of that description is essential to knowing that the series veers from the novel as well as the 1995 film of the same title.

Miami loan shark Chili Palmer (played in the movie by John Travolta) is nowhere to be found in the TV series.

Instead, the hood with dreams of making it big in Hollywood is Irish actor Chris O’Dowd’s Miles Daly, a hitman from Nevada who wants to leave behind his criminal past.

Of course, given that even a series based only in part on an Elmore Leonard novel does not escape the prolific author’s idiosyncratic style in writing crime fiction, the TV series may have to convince the purists to put aside any doubts.

Miles and his best friend Louis (Sean Bridgers) are the muscle for a crime ring based in Pahrump, Nevada, a dusty town located in the middle of nowhere sixty miles from Vegas but closer to Death Valley.

The gang is involved in everything from gambling and prostitution to drug running and extortion. The leader is the matronly Amara (Lidia Porto) assisted by her primary henchman Yago (Goya Robles), a hot-tempered, trigger-happy moron with the brains of a beans and cheese burrito.

Flashbacks inform us that Amara was raised in a harsh environment in rural Guatemala and that a hard early life molded her into a ruthless crime boss who is now looking to find new ways to launder cash into a legitimate front.

Maybe it’s fortuitous that Miles has dreams of becoming a movie producer in Hollywood after a botched hit job in Los Angeles results in his possession of a dandy movie script for a costume drama set in England.

With his wife Katie (Lucy Walters) having grown weary of his illegitimate career, Miles wants to win her back from a slick golf pro by taking an improbable leap into the movies without the slightest idea how to navigate the cutthroat yet glamorous business in Tinseltown.

Spending more time in the pleasant California climate, Miles meets Rick Moreweather (Ray Romano), relegated to a crummy studio office that reflects his status of a washed-up producer of low-quality films that go straight to video.

Moreweather is desperately hanging onto the rungs of Hollywood relevancy and is constantly brushed aside by go-getter studio executive April Quinn (Megan Stevenson) who takes an initial fascination with Miles’ bold and assertive push for a script no one at the studio has even read.

In the world of Elmore Leonard, the conceit is that thugs in love with the movies are seduced by the glamorous notion of making movies. The humor comes from quirky things like tough guy Miles saying he can’t read a script in a car because it makes him carsick.

As much as Miles wants his criminal history to become something of the past, it keeps rearing its ugly head at the most inopportune moments, including when Yago beats the golf pro senseless over a dispute about a parked car in front of Miles’ new Hollywood residence.

Back in Nevada, Amara and her goons are engaged in a violent turf war with a rival gang. Contrary to the wishes of Yago and his desire to use a tacky, loud nightclub for money laundering, Amara becomes enamored of the idea that she could finance a film that might star John Stamos.

Ray Romano’s Moreweather is delightfully sleazy as the B-movie producer who struggles with cost overruns and prima donna actors whose passions are limited to being serviced by prostitutes in their trailers.

Despite misgivings, Moreweather begrudgingly becomes Miles’ partner to film the script entitled “The Admiral’s Mistress” on a limited budget financed by underworld cash, even though his reservations give way to the reality of trying to keep his failing career afloat.

Three episodes of “Get Shorty” were made available for preview, and it is evident that unlike the movie the pace is definitely slower in order to stretch the intrigue to a larger timeframe. The characters may prove interesting enough for a long-term investment.

At the summer TV press tour, Chris O’Dowd had an interesting take on the difference between the film and the TV series, noting that both are using the same original material with the book but “it’s like visiting a bar at a different time of the week.”

“The movie’s kind of like going to a bar on a Saturday night when everybody’s looking well,” said O’Dowd, and “we kind of visit the bar at 3 a.m. on a Thursday, when the floor is kind of sticky. And the bar bill’s about to arrive and you can’t afford to pay it.”

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
Posted On


CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – Legendary blues-rock guitarist and vocalist Coco Montoya, currently celebrating his return to Alligator Records and the release of his new CD, “Hard Truth,” will perform as part of the Cache Creek Vineyards' Summer Concert Series in Clearlake Oaks on Saturday, Aug. 19.

Showtime is at 8 p.m.

Taught by the "Master of the Telecaster," Albert Collins, and schooled by a decade on the road with John Mayall, Montoya – who cut three successful CDs for Alligator between 2000 and 2007 – has a hard-edged sound and style all his own.

He delivers instantly memorable songs, powered by his forceful, melodic guitar playing and passionate vocals. Concert information is as follows:

Montoya earned his status as a master guitarist and soul-powered vocalist through years of paying his dues as a sideman with Albert Collins (first as a drummer) and then as a featured guitarist with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, before launching his solo career in 1993.

Five years of constant touring with Collins and ten years with Mayall turned him into a monster player and dynamic performer.

Montoya has released eight previous solo albums to great critical and popular acclaim, and has played at clubs, concert halls and major festivals all over the world. Guitar Player says Montoya plays "stunning, powerhouse blues with a searing tone, emotional soloing, and energetic, unforced vocals."

Still an indefatigable road warrior, Montoya continues to pack clubs and theaters around the world, and brings festival audiences to their feet from New York to New Orleans to Chicago to San Francisco.

Across the globe, he's performed in countries including Australia, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, England, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, Mexico, Ecuador, Italy, Poland, Russia, Czech Republic and Canada.

Vintage Guitar says, "Coco just keeps getting better and better...rockin' blues with guitar that cuts straight to the heart of the matter. His guitar playing is funky and blistering; it's perfect. Whatever he plays, he does it with fire and passion rarely seen in this day and age."

Tickets are $26.87 per person general admission or $91.16 for VIP admission.

Cache Creek Vineyards is located at 250 New Long Valley Road in Clearlake Oaks, telephone 707-998-1200 or online at www.cachecreekvineyards.com.
Posted On


TV CORNER: MR. MERCEDES ON AUDIENCE NETWORK

For original programming, the AT&T Audience Network has masterfully adapted prolific author Stephen King’s hard-boiled detective story and thriller “Mr. Mercedes” into a ten-episode series that results in creepy horror that is anything but supernatural.

A vile act of horrible carnage is vividly and brutally depicted at an Ohio job fair during the economically depressed time of 2009 when unemployed job aspirants line up during the middle of the night for an opportunity to find new work.

The crowd scene at the job fair includes a young woman holding an infant child during the chilly pre-dawn hours along with a young male stranger who proves helpful to the woman while remaining cheerfully optimistic. But, as you would expect, that is about to drastically change.

Lurking nearby is a late-model Mercedes with an unseen driver revving the engine as he inexplicably rushes straight for the crowd, going on a deadly rampage to run over and kill as many people as possible. The parallel to recent terrorist attacks in Europe is unmistakable.

Jump forward two years and police detective Bill Hodges (the brilliant Brendan Gleeson), a decorated officer who worked the Mercedes case, has retired because his investigative career has fizzled and crashed as the result of a frustrating inability to solve the crime.

Sitting at home with little to do other than feed his pet tortoise, watch television and drink copious amounts of alcohol (yeah, it seems the Irish-accented, overweight retired cop is a stereotype for drunks of his ethnic identity).

One of Bill’s former colleagues, Pete Dixon (Scott Lawrence) comes around to visit, expressing concern about his potential suicidal tendencies, but feelings of sympathy start to dissipate when Bill shows increased interest in resolving the cold case of the Mercedes killings.

Bill is stirred from the lethargy of retirement when the real killer taunts him through the computer for not solving the murders. Obviously, the killer has tech skills and it’s not hard to see that computer nerd Brady (Harry Treadaway) is ready for a challenging cat-and-mouse game.

Working at a Radio Shack-type superstore, Brady lives with his mom (Kelly Lynch), an alcoholic widow who shows way too much affection for the creepy son that hides in the basement, ostensibly working on secretive computer projects.

Not able to catch a break, Bill is also needled by his lonely neighbor, Ida (Holland Taylor), who questions when he last had sex, trying to seduce him by showing pictures on her cell phone of her naked body.

Meanwhile, the killer, who prowls the neighborhood in a part-time job driving an ice cream truck, mocks the detective’s professional impotence on cracking the case, sending threatening letters and interrupting his computer and TV set with cryptic messages.

Retracing old steps with the help of the teenage tech-savvy Jerome (Jharrel Jerome), Bill hopes to find a break that would put him on the trail of the killer, even though the police insist that some hapless drifter has already confessed to the crime.

Searching for clues in the impounded Mercedes, Bill comes away with the notion that there must be an explanation for how the car was stolen when the owner insisted so forcefully that she didn’t lose the keys.

While the car owner is no longer around for follow-up questioning, her sister Janey (Mary-Louise Parker) is only too willing to hire Bill as a private detective to reopen the case the police show no interest in pursuing any further.

The lack of police cooperation with Bill, who is now viewed increasingly as an aimless drunk on the verge of an early trip to the grave, creates a lot of tension between the retired detective and just about everyone else in law enforcement.

The “Mr. Mercedes” series has been created by David E. Kelley, who has a strong track record in television having crafted popular shows like “Chicago Hope” and “Boston Legal” along with the recent HBO special series “Big Little Lies.” Writing for robust performances is his strong suit.

The first four episodes were made available for preview, and based on the simmering tension with an odd range of characters, most particularly the disturbing behavior of the unhinged Brady, it’s safe to say that a lot of surprises remain in waiting.

This adaptation is different from the usual horror stories, but at the gathering of the Television Critics Association summer press tour, Harry Treadway astutely observed that “Stephen King taps into the zeitgeist of what scares us so amazingly well,” even on the human rather than supernatural level.

“Mr. Mercedes” has captured my rapt attention to the eerie patterns of behavioral quirks, from those of Brady’s coworkers to the disinterest of Bill’s old colleagues, and watching the remaining six episodes seems like something approximating a necessity.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
Blog Left ad
Posted On

Ted Kooser. Photo credit: UNL Publications and Photography.


Here's a poem celebrating milkweed by Bradford Tice, whose most recent book of poetry is What the Night Numbered, from Trio House Press.

Our Monarch butterfly population depends upon milkweed, and perhaps a few people who read this won't chop down or pull up or poison one of these generous plants.

Milkweed

I tell myself softly, this is how love begins—
the air alive with something inconceivable,
seeds of every imaginable possibility
floating across the wet grasses, under
the thin arms of ferns. It drifts like snow
or old ash, settling on the dust of the roadways
as you and I descend into thickets, flanked
by the fragrance of honeysuckle and white
primrose.

I recall how my grandmother imagined
these wanderers were living beings,
some tiny phylum yet to be classified as life.
She would say they reminded her of maidens
decked in white dresses, waltzing through air.
Even after I showed her the pods from which
they sprang, blossoming like tiny spiders,
she refused to believe.

Now, standing beside you in the crowded
autumn haze, I watch them flock, emerge from
brittle stalks, bursting upon the world as
young lovers do—trysting in the tall grasses,
resting fingers lightly in tousled hair.
Listen, and you can hear them whisper
in the rushes, gazing out at us, wondering—
what lives are these?

American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited submissions. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2013 by Bradford Tice, “Milkweed,” from Rare Earth, (New Rivers Press, 2013). Poem reprinted by permission of Bradford Tice and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2017 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

Subcategories

Cinema

Home and Garden

LCNews

Responsible local journalism on the shores of Clear Lake.

 

Memberships:

 

Search