Go On is Matthew Perry's third lousy show since Friends went off the air. We told you that Studio 60 On Sunset Strip sucked when the Water Cooler Set insisted it was hilarious. (Hilarious is that the critiques we made while the Water Cooler Set slept suddenly caught traction as Newsroom finally resulted in Aaron Sorkin's long on the screen sexism being noticed.) In early 2011, Mr. Sunshine debuted and, again, the Water Cooler Set was sure you'd love it. You hated it. No surprise there, we did as well.
If this were baseball, strike three would mean Perry would be out after this show. However, this is TV and that means that Perry, being a man, will get six or seven chances. A woman, by contrast, gets only one time to strike out on TV.
If it seems strange us working in sports, it's no stranger than Perry talking sports. He plays the host of a talk radio sports show. Yes, this is the man whose only successful TV role thus far has been Chandler Bing. If you didn't just nod your head knowingly, join us as we drop back to season seven of Friends, episode 20, "The One With Rachel's Big Kiss" (written by Shana Goldberg-Meehan and Scott Silveri) for the scene where Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) is helping Chandler (Perry) find a tuxedo.
Chandler: You mean these tuxes have been down the red carpet with people yelling, "Who are you wearing? You look fabulous!"
Rachel: Honey, might I suggest watching a little more ESPN and a little less E!?
Chandler: Okay, who wore those?
Rachel: Uhm, well, let's see. Uh, this one is Tom Brokaw.
Chandler: Not bad.
Rachel: This one is Paul O'Neil.
Chandler: Who's that?
Rachel: He plays for the Yankees. Seriously, ESPN. Just once and a while, have it on in the background.
It was a very funny minor scene in the episode (this is the episode where Winona Ryder guest stars as the Rachel's old sorority sister, the only woman Rachel ever made out with). It was funny because it was so Chandler.
Grasp that because no one at NBC or Universal did. Matthew Perry's persona onscreen is not that of a sport fan. So why have him play one? He's failed in two other shows and for his third show you're going to have him in a profession no one would believe?
What we couldn't believe was how bad he looked. If a woman showed up on camera like that, she wouldn't get one strike, she wouldn't even see her show get on the air.
The spray tan (we hope that's not make up) stops an inch before his hairline making him look ridiculous and it does nothing to conceal those awful bags under his eyes. Actually, bags? Those are vintage Louis Vuitton Steamer Trunks. Then there is the sweater and his turning to the side frequently as he displays side boob. Saggy side boob. Really saggy side boob.
And what's up with the way he's delivering lines? His voice is coming from the roof of his mouth (it's higher and flat out weird) and his delivery is so halting and unsure that he comes off drunk. (We called to ask if he was sick and an NBC friend said, "Doesn't he sound like Michael J. Fox? Not in Family Ties, but right now?" Since you brought it up, yes, he does and it's very curious to put it mildly.)
But so much is very curious lately. Like NPR.
No, we're not talking about the usual sexism running free as Audie Cornish plays idiot (she's playing, right?) while Eric Deggans humps the microphone and pretends he's a TV critic but all he offers is men, men, men. There are women on TV. We realize that when confronted with Oprah's network, Eric's penis shrunk in fear, "[. . .] it's a little scary to enter a world where my concerns are among the least considered in the universe."
His concerns. His interests. He's not a TV critic. He's a bad writer and he's worse on NPR. This is the third time we've called out Deggans (see here and here) for his sexism on NPR. Please note, we let most of it slide because we just don't have the time. It's very rare that Deggans appears without being sexist.
Where has the NPR ombudsperson been during all of this? And it's not one person. This has been going on through two terms. And as we've pointed out before, many times, NPR is over-run with male TV critics. Possibly the critics are booked because they, like NPR, won't give women equal time?
We're referring to the number of women booked as guests [for instance, see "Terry Gross' new low (Ann, Ava and C.I.)"] but, as our pen-pal Alicia Shephard noted in 2010, women rarely show up in NPR's news stories. And when they do, it can be very weird.
We're thinking of several stories last week, but we'll zoom in on just one, the report Larry Abramson filed on Morning Edition Wednesday. Abramaon informed listeners, "Crystal Gregory says she's supporting the Obama ticket because the budget plan proposed by congressman Ryan -- which never became law -- would change Medicare into a voucher program." Then she's featured declaring, "And since the mission of the Ryan budget is to change Medicare as we know it, and the mission of many people in the Republican Party is to privatize Social Security, I want to make sure that doesn't happen."
It was curious for a number of reasons, among them the inability to fact check Gregory who badly needs to be enlightened. Let's drop back to the January 9, 2008 "Iraq snapshot:"
Turning to US politics, as Cedric and Wally pointed out last night, Barack's ready to 'tackle' that mythical Social Security 'crisis.' Patrick Murphy (WSWS) explains,
"Barack Obama took the occasion of his first press appearance in
Washington as president-elect to declare his determination to impose
policies of budgetary austerity, including the elimination of entire
federal programs and cost-cutting in the entitlement programs such as
Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid that are of vital importance to
tens of millions of elderly and poor people." Murphy goes on to warn
against the impending "frontal assault on the most important components
of what remains of a social safety net in the United States --
the programs that provide at least minimal retirement benefits and
medical coverage for tens of millions of elderly people, as well as
medical coverage for millions of low-income families." Too busy
wallowing in his own filth, The 'Progressive's CEO Matthew Rothschild
praises the speech and begins his long belch/gush with, "One of the
things I like most about Barack . . ." Do tell, sweetie, do tell.
("Obama Hits Many High Notes in Speech on the Economy" -- no link to
trash, Google it if you need a good laugh.) Hillary Is 44 ignores
Matty Roth's recommended Kool-Aid (Spineless Saffrow flavored) and
declares, "Obama has now revealed what his legacy is to be -- the
destruction of Social Security. Ignore the flowery words, Obama is
planning a great treachery. Expect PINOs to be silent." Murphy (PUMA Pac) notes, "No wonder the Wall Street Boiz gave so much money
to the Precious (ooh, that soft money feels so good). Fat times ahead
for them. Hats in hand for the rest of us. Thought it will be rather
amusing to watch the BOIZ' reaction to this hard swing right." Chris Floyd (Empire Burlesque) offers this context:
This
is of course the same argument that George W. Bush made after the 2004
election, when he sought to sell off Social Security to those same
"financial markets" that Obama is now trying so assiduously to soothe.
No doubt, we will soon see the old scare stories that filled the media
then trotted out once again, this time in "progressive" garb. But the
truth remains the same: the programs are essentially sound and can be
maintained with only relatively small adjustments for many decades, as
far as one can reasonably project into the future.
And now to the "Iraq snapshot" from January 16, 2009:
Turning to US politics, President-elect Barack Obama met with the Washington Post editorial board yesterday. Here for Michael D Shear's text article, here for the sixty-one minute audio.
Warning for those listening to the audio, Barack's speaking abilities
have not magically improved. Sample: "Uh, obivoulsy military service is
uh something we uh honor as a country [. . .] That's going to be
something that we uh uh . . ." And four minutes, for those wondering,
he takes his first swipe at African-American fathers. Yes, it's Barack
singing all his well known tunes. And mixing in a few new ones such as,
"It's not something I've said publicly . . . but spending money wisely
is not easy." Mostly, the interview will be remembered as the one where
Barack declared War on Social Security. Barack's replied to questions
and made vague statements. But, his Love Cult insists, that's just the
Nice Guy Barry trying to make nice and get along. He doesn't want to
say, "Stupid crooks, Social Security is not going to be chipped away!"
Well, actually he does want to say that and he did say that.
[. . .]
He
begins talking about his big "Fiscal Responsibility Summit" that will be
held in February and include a motley crew that will "talk about
waste." He then segues into Social Security during this response (at
approximately 16:14) and states the following:
We're
also going to have a discussion about entitlements and how we get a
grasp on those. Uh and uh, you know, like i think everybody here is
familiar enough with the budget problems to know that as bad as these
deficits that we're running up over the next -- that have already been
run up -- have been and despite the cost of both TARP and the stimulus,
the real problem in our long term deficit actually has to do with our
entitlement obligation and the fact that historically uh if our revenues
ranged between 18 and 20% of GDP they're now at 16. It's just not
sustainable so we're going to have to uh craft a uh
what George Stephanopoulos called a grand bargain and I-I try not to use
the word grand in anything that I say but uh but we're going to have to
shape a bargain. This, by the way, is where there are going to be
some very difficult choices and issues of sacrifices and responsibility
and duty are going to come in because what we have done is kick this
can down the road. We're now at the end of the road and uh we are not
in a position to kick it any further.
Those
are right-wing talking points and only the most historically ignorant
of Barack's Love Cult will fail to grasp the declaration of war.
Is Crystal Gregory aware of any of that? Not from her statements. And Abramson made no attempt to inform her or listeners of his report. He didn't even note Barack's January 11, 2009 discussion with George Stephanopoulos on This Week (ABC -- video and text):
STEPHANOPOULOS:
Let me press you on this, at the end of the day, are you really talking
about over the course of your presidency some kind of a grand bargain?
That you have tax reform, health care reform, entitlement reform,
including Social Security and Medicare where everybody in the country is
going to have to sacrifice something, accept change for the greater
good?
OBAMA: Yes.
STEPHANOPOULOS: And when will that get done?
OBAMA:
Well, the -- right now I'm focused on a pretty heavy lift, which is
making sure that we get that reinvestment and recovery package in place.
But what you describe is exactly what we're going to have to do.
What
we have to do is to take a look at our structural deficit, how are we
paying for government, what are we getting for it, and how do we make
the system more efficient?
STEPHANOPOULOS: And eventually sacrifice from everyone.
OBAMA: Everybody is going to have to give. Everybody is going to have to have some skin in the game.
And that's why, though Abramson played dumb, Barack created the Simpson - Bowles Commission. February 18, 2010, he issued Executive Order 13531 which created the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform ("By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Establishment. There is established within the Executive Office of the President the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform . . .").
But Simpson - Bowles died, right?
Unlike in the land of TV, nothing written ever gets tossed in D.C., it just gets put in a folder and saved for a rainy day.
Back in June, Donald Haider (Bloomberg News) offered that the cuts Simpson - Bowles proposed (Social Security, Medicare, etc.) weren't off the table, they were merely waiting for "the lame-duck session, the period after the Nov. 6 elections and before newly elected officials take office in January. This is when compromises on new revenue and entitlement cuts have a sporting chance of passage. The good news is that there are signals that negotiations could center around the debt-reduction recommendations of the bipartisan Simpson - Bowles panel two years ago."
And if actual research was beyond 'journalist' Abramson's skills, if it was too much for him, all he had to do was check out the rival campaigns. As Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein's campaign observed last week, "In elevating deficit reduction to his highest priority and setting up
the deficit reduction supercommittee in 2011, President Obama made it
clear that benefits programs were on the chopping block and that he
would negotiate with Republicans on how to curtail them. Now,
Representative Paul Ryan’s budget is in the spotlight, which also
threatens services that millions of Americans depend on." And you could read that online, you just couldn't hear on an NPR-produced 'news' program.
Larry Abramson seemed much more interested in painting Joe Biden as a flirt without having the guts to say so (listen to the report or read the transcript). That's probably why Abramson didn't notice the flaw in his providing education remarks from Biden and noting the vice president's wife is an educator. He opens with Biden and a voter decrying a voucher system . . . for Medicare. But ends on education and fails to note just how hard the Obama administration has pimped vouchers for schools.
Again, it makes no sense.
And neither does Go On.
For example, Perry's character Ryan King will be visited in dreams by his dead wife (played by Christine Woods) in future episodes. Did NBC not see the ratings for last season's A Gifted Man? It also included a dead wife who 'visited'? It lasted 16 episodes.
It's because of the dead wife that Ryan enters a grief group. And Ryan and the writers get to mock the woman who leads the group (Lauren, played by Laura Benanti) because her only training in addressing an issue was in weight loss. Ryan and the writers have a chuckle over that as they set Ryan up as the all knowing. But, thing is, Ryan's not addressed anything, so group facilitator Lauren is still one up on him. And Ryan's snide 'get over it' attitude towards people who have lost loved ones is not only snide, it's offensive.
As usual, we're several up on NBC. Doubt us?
After watching the two additional episodes and reading over the press material, we listened to two NBC suits prattle on and on about how we will find this show funny, we must find it funny, when it debuts officially on Tuesday nights. On Tuesday nights, they insisted to us, it will be funny.
We weren't aware Tuesdays were so magical.
The reality is that it's offensive for NBC to debut a show mocking grieving people who've lost their loves ones on a Tuesday.
If you don't get what we're saying, pick up a calendar and then explain to us how September 11, 2012 -- the 11th anniversary of 9-11 -- is the perfect day to officially debut a sitcom where Matthew Perry smirks and snarks about people grieving over dead loved ones? As we noted at the top, grossly stupid and grossly offensive.
