Question: I enjoyed TNT's The Company and am currently catching up on ESPN's The Bronx Is Burning. My question is, why did TNT have to inundate its presentation of this otherwise serious program with crawling advertisements for other shows? I'm aware that I can also catch Saving Grace on TNT — the network takes every opportunity during the commercial breaks to let me know. Why do I need to see a miniature Holly Hunter walking around at the bottom of the screen during The Company? By comparison, ESPN, a network that arguably doesn't need to take itself as seriously, presents The Bronx Is Burning with only a small network logo in the corner of the screen. TNT had every reason to treat The Company with respect — the show was well executed on many levels. But even the failure to let the ending credits play uninterrupted for a few seconds got on my nerves. Decisions like these indicate that TNT was far more interested in using every imaginable opportunity to shove obnoxious ads down ...
read more
Question: Is TNT going to repeat The Company in one solid, six-hour block?
Answer: Not to my knowledge. After repeated questions about this, I checked, and I was told the miniseries isn't on TNT's playlist anytime in the near future. The fact that its ratings were a disappointment may have had something to do with this. A DVD will be released in October, and episodes are currently available online, if that helps ...
read more
The DVD release date for I Dream of Jeannie: The Complete Fourth Season has been pushed back a week to Sept. 11. (The delay? Some nonsense about genies not being able to be photographed.) Meanwhile, DVD releases have been set for Face/Off: Special Collector's Edition (the only movie my wife has literally walked out on, Sept. 11), TNT's The Company miniseries (also available in Blu-ray, Oct. 23), The Batman: The Complete Fourth Season, Teen Titans: The Complete Fourth Season (Nov. 20), and Dirt: The Complete First Season (Dec. 11).
read more
Wow! What a strong conclusion for what’s sure to be recognized as one of the year’s best miniseries. The tone this time was definitely more of a piece with The Company’s slow-building first part than last week’s globe-trotting actionfest. But the dark, regretful feeling that permeated every action, every conversation, was, in the end, the only way things could have turned out.Watching the complete breakdown of Leo (Alessandro Nivola) throughout his interrogation was shocking — in part because of its swiftness, but more so because his only crime was being too loyal to the Company. Or so it seemed, until we found out he was the mole, Sasha, all along — a fact he later revealed by shooting his best friend and godfather of his children in the gut and fleeing to the crumbling remains of his adopted homeland.Truly, it seems, the Cold War was a grand debacle, perhaps summed up best by Michael Keaton ’s Angleton in his greenhouse conversation with Chris O&...
read more
Question: I am so pleased with the programming offered this summer. In fact, I think a lot of this summer's shows are better than the regular fall lineup (with a few exceptions). Wouldn't it be interesting if next year's Emmy nominations were filled with more summer candidates than fall ones? I can't believe the acting from the likes of Damages, The Kill Point, Mad Men, Big Love, Californication, etc would be overlooked. In the past, they've thrown a bone to a few summer favorites, recognizing Monk, The Closer and Weeds. But there are only so many spots available. I think the writers and producers of this fall's programming had better step it up a notch. What do you think the chances are that next year's Emmy nominations will be filled with a lot of these summer hits instead of fall shows?
Answer: It would be gratifying, but don't hold your breath beyond some of the no-brainers (like, say, Glenn Close). I'm thinking newfangled miniseries like Kil
read more
Question: I've been watching TV for so long, I remember when test patterns were "must-watch TV." Critics fondly reminisce about the golden years, and there were some truly great years. But am I wrong to think that we are now in the platinum age of television? As this past winter season wound down, this DVR viewer was bummed by the thought of a long summer season of reality shows, relieved only by Rescue Me. To my surprise (and here's a plug for TV Guide), I learned about some of the new series that would be flung all over the cable globe: Mad Men, The Bronx Is Burning, Damages, Kill Point (episodes piling up as I try to catch up with other shows) and now I hear buzz about The Company. Add to that So You Think You Can Dance (far superior to American Idol), Top Chef and Hell's Kitchen, and my personal addiction The Daily Show, and I just can't find enough hours to watch. So my question is: Why don't the networks just give up the full season philosophy (usually thrown in with repeats or as ...
read more
With another two strong hours under its belt, The Company is really shaping up to be the miniseries of the year, and one to watch out for come the next Emmy nominations. Though the second section of a three-parter often suffers a little from being necessarily transitional (see the Lord of the Rings and Bourne trilogies), this episode side-stepped that trap, starting with a tried-and-true device: Open with a shocking dramatic event — say, the capture and torture of a main character (Jack) — then fall back three days to show how we got to this point.But what looked from the previews last week to be the climax of this episode was only the beginning of the excitement. You could have made two stand-alone films out of this one’s two main set pieces: The Hungarian uprising, shot as a bloody gun battle in an urban wasteland, and the botched Bay of Pigs invasion, a full-scale beach-storming under cover of darkness that rivaled any Hollywood war movie. While "Night 1" was about...
read more
Alfred Molina, The Company
One CIA mole down, one to go? On Night 1 of TNT's The Company, Alfred Molina's Harvey Torriti made clever use of a few "Barium meals" to suss out a deep-placed snitch within the spy group's ranks. If only that were the end of their problems. As the series — executive-produced by Ridley and Tony Scott — resumes this Sunday at 8 pm/ET, the action weaves in a Hungarian uprising and the Bay of Pigs debacle, all while a second mole flies under the radar. TVGuide.com spoke with Molina about the twists and turns ahead.
TVGuide.com: What brought you to this project? Was it the pedigree of the Scotts?Alfred Molina: That didn't hurt, but when I received the script and they told me who and what was involved, it just struck me as a really exciting thing. The script was terrific and it was a wonderful part. I was very, very happy to get involved.
TVGuide.com: Are you an espionage buff at all?Molina: A little bit. I'
read more
Michael Keaton, Chris O'Donnell and Alfred Molina in The Company by Nigel Parry/TNT
• Sunday night's premiere of The Company, TNT's three-week miniseries about the Cold War CIA, averaged 2.9 million total viewers — 66 percent of whom were age 50 or older, Variety notes. In comparison, TNT's Nightmares & Dreamscapes mini did 44 percent better in its July '06 bow, while the cabler's Saving Grace and Heartland opened to 6.4 and 4.3 mil, respectively. C'mon, people, it stars Batman, Robin and Doc Ock!• ABC Family's Fallen returned to 1.7 and 2.3 million in its Saturday/Sunday installments.• Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane premiered Sunday to 335,000 viewers, more than doubling Style Network's typical tally.
read more
Let me start off with a disclaimer: I’m not familiar with the Robert Littell novel of the same name on which The Company is based. However, based on the Internet buzz, I know a lot of fans of the book have been very much anticipating this miniseries. So what I ask of you, readers, is that you be as understanding as you can about my lack of foreknowledge, while still feeling free to tell me what’s what when I get it wrong. Thanks in advance. [end disclaimer]Well, we're only a third of the way in, but so far, I like what I'm seeing. Even abridged as it must be for TV, this is clearly a complex, multilayered story. The Company is juggling a large cast of international characters who are constantly double- and triple-crossing each other, but thankfully, I didn't have to strain too hard to keep it all straight. I don't know if the novel's focus was so squarely on the characters of Jack (Chris O'Donnell) and Yevgeny (Rory Cochrane), but the friends-turned-enemies situation set u...
read more
