Martin Short, Lily Tomlin, Keith Carradine
FX's Damages returns to production for its third season this week with four big names added to its cast: Campbell Scott, Martin Short, Lily Tomlin and Keith Carradine.
Campbell Scott (Royal Pains) and Martin Short (Primetime Glick) have become series regulars, while Lily Tomlin (The West Wing) and Keith Carradine (Dexter) join as special guest stars. Details of their roles...
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Carrie Ann Inaba
Hi everyone,
Hope everyone is doing well and having a fun pre-Emmy week like I am. The Emmys are almost here!!!!!!!!!! Have you all chosen your dress to wear at home? It doesn't have to be quite as glamorous as the ones we wear when we walk the Red Carpet, but why not make a day of it? Invite your friends over and get dressed up! Put on the lashes, the tanning cream, the heels (well, forget the heels, you don't need to wear them), get your hair done and then grab a container of popcorn and join Chris and me as we take you right into the excitement that is the EMMYS!
I always think it's more fun when you have someone to turn to and say...
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Rose Byrne, Damages
Its first time around, FX's Damages dangled before viewers the season-long question of who killed aspiring legal eagle Ellen Parson's fiancé. Season 2, premiering Wednesday at 10 pm/ET, opens with a dead-serious Ellen talking to someone off-screen — whom she ultimately shoots. And then we flash back, in dramatic Damages style, to "Six Months Earlier." TVGuide.com invited Rose Byrne to shed as much light as she could on Ellen's dark missions of vengeance ahead.
TVGuide.com: Season 2 literally starts with a bang, doesn't it?
Rose Byrne: Yes, literally. It was a lot of fun to film. It's similar to last season, setting up the two different timelines.
TVGuide.com: Are you glad they held onto that framing device? I know there was a bit of pressure to make the show a bit...
Byrne: Clearer, yeah. We still have that catchy thing with the two timelines, to help build the mystery side of it. But I think it is clearer, not as complicated, if you will. It's not a murder, it's more about figuring out who Ellen is talking to [while holding the gun]. Over the course of the season, you can make your mind up.
TVGuide.com: How dark a place is Ellen at these days?
Byrne: Oh she's in the depths of grief and trauma and ...
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Glenn Close by Craig Blankenhorn/Sony Pictures TV, Jonathan Rhys Meyers by Jonathan Hession/Showtime, Jennifer Beals by Paul Michaud/Showtime
Three good things about the writers' strike:1) No more Bionic Woman to disappoint us.2) Pepito the Wonder Chihuahua gets more "me" time.3) More chances to catch up on kick-ass cable shows on DVD!And let me tell you, that last one is a biggie, considering that a few cable shows I had to skip out on because of too many TiVo conflicts have just hit the shelves. One of them being FX's stellar, chilling Damages, which features quite possibly the single greatest performance of the last season. Is Golden Globe winner Glenn Close's Manhattan litigator Patty Hewes ingenious or pure evil? I'm not sure yet, but she is delicious nonetheless and I am having a hoot finding out.Centered around an Enron-type class-action suit against billionaire Arthur Frobisher — played with demonic menace by Ted Danson — the show should be about the case, since nobody does trial-angst better than Close (see Jagged Edge). But instead of courtrooms, we get boardrooms and some seriously twisted detours, co...
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Sunshine courtesy Fox Home Entertainment
The year is 2057, the sun is dying, and mankind faces extinction. Earth's last hope rests with the crew of Icarus II, on a mission to deliver a nuclear payload into the center of the sun. Icarus I failed the same mission 7 years earlier, but no one knows why; can the crew of Icarus II save mankind?This Blu-ray disc is loaded with interesting bonus material, and is the first "Bonus View" (aka Profile 1.1) title from Fox. There are two commentary tracks for the feature, one featuring director Danny Boyle, and the other with Dr. Brian Cox from the University of Manchester.Both commentary tracks were fascinating! Boyle had lots to say about the movie, the production, and the actors. He spoke through the entire movie, without the long pauses that plague so many single-person commentary tracks. Dr. Cox, the scientific advisor on the movie, did an incredible job of sharing his wealth of scientific knowledge on his commentary. He clearly had a lot of fun working on the movie, and I loved li...
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If the barometer of an interesting TV awards show is the number of fresh faces invited to the party, then the Golden Globe nominations (announced Thursday morning) passes the test. Not with a perfect score, mind you. Any institution that so completely ignores NBC's wonderful Friday Night Lights deserves some spirited jeering.And the Globes' addiction to sexy sizzle and hype can lead to some puzzling choices: Big Love, fun as it is, over The Sopranos' final season? Bill Paxton over James Gandolfini? (And if the Globes is going to shower love on Big Love, how could the women who play Bill's wives go unheralded, especially Ginnifer Goodwin?) Californication over Weeds?But let's look at the bright side. The Hollywood Foreign Press clearly spent some time checking out the TV landscape during last summer's remarkable season of cable breakthroughs. My own pick for No. 1 show of the year, AMC's Mad Men, is nominated for best drama, along with its dashing leading man, Jon Hamm. FX's Damages,...
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Glenn Close, Damages
Has Arthur Frobisher snorted his last line off a hooker's bosom? Was Patty truly behind Ellen's attempted murder? And how does Patty's ill-fated teen pregnancy fit into it all? Shortly after the first-season finale of FX's Damages, TVGuide.com asked the series' creators — Todd A. Kessler, Daniel Zelman and Glenn Kessler — to fill in some blanks. Plus, the latest word on a possible Season 2 pickup.
TVGuide.com: First up, Arthur Frobisher — is he dead?Todd A. Kessler: It all depends on whether he is able to make a phone call there in the field and save himself. But we were so thrilled with Ted Danson
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Tate Donovan and Rose Byrne by Barbara Nitke/FX
Before we get to the reasons why Tuesday night’s finale of Damages should be a model for how a serialized show on the ropes should end a season — in high style, resolving many major plot points while cunningly setting up a second season (if there is a second season) — here are a few observations on some other positive TV news.The full-season pickup for Pushing Daisies. Best news of the week. Ever since the pilot began to circulate last spring, the reaction has been a mix of delight and unease: first, amazement that something this fabulous was coming to TV; second, skepticism that the TV audience would embrace it; and lastly, whether it could sustain the same quality after the knockout first hour. The answer so far has been affirmative, especially (and to me, most critically) in the quality arena. Each episode has been a gas, a treat, a knockout. With great buzz and solid if not spectacular numbers, ABC did the right thing in giving Daisies even more room to grow.The o...
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Glenn Close by Barbara Nitke/FX
Cheers to Damages for ending its first season with a major bang. FX's legal thriller answered an amazing number of questions — from (Spoiler alert for DVR viewers) the location of the incriminating videotape (it was inside the Statue of Liberty murder weapon!) to the revelation that Patty (Glenn Close) apparently tried to have Ellen (Rose Byrne) killed — while leaving others tantalizingly unresolved. Is Frobisher (Ted Danson) dead? Will Ellen be able to help the FBI bring down Patty? And what's taking FX so long to renew Damages for a second season? If they don't, it'll be a real crime. (For more on that, check out today's Ask Ausiello.)Got burning questions about the Damages finale? Share them here, and TVGuide.com will try to get them answered.More Cheers & Jeers: Read and react to Bruce's opinions on Heroes, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Mad Men and Bionic Woman, then share your own raves and rants about other shows on the new Reader Cheers & Jeers discussion board. You...
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Rose Byrne in Damages by Barbara Nitke/FX
This Saturday, FX is running the entire first season (up to now) of its legal thriller Damages as an all-day marathon, which means theoretically there will be viewers who will get to experience this show the way it might work best: as a rock ’em, sock ’em miniseries, compounding all of the story’s elaborate and sometimes preposterous shocks and twists into a roller-coaster ride that doesn’t require waiting a week between chapters.The ratings have been, even by cable standards, a disappointment, and as I write this, FX had yet to confirm a second-season renewal (although as I’ve said before, any network that would keep Dirt and The Riches going and fail to renew this gritty gem has some explaining to do). I’ve wondered if the show’s elaborately serialized structure, with an entire season built around a single case and its murderous fallout, may have kept viewers away (shades of ABC’s short-lived Murder One).The brutality and darkness of Damages...
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