"It's lonely at the top," they say, and Season 3 of HBO's just-renewed, Emmy-winning hit Boardwalk Empire has become a veritable tutorial on that hallowed adage. Never the most slap-happy of protagonists, Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi), the bootlegging kingpin of the show's 1920s Atlantic City, has been...
Jim Caviezel and Michael Emerson have already had a long day. They're shooting the first scene of a new Person of Interest episode featuring their ...
Jim Caviezel is knackered. It's about noon, and he and Person of Interest costar Michael Emerson have just concluded a gauntlet of satellite interviews at CBS' Midtown Manhattan headquarters. He apologetically struggles under our...
If HBO's period gangster epic Boardwalk Empire has a single truism to impart to working stiffs, it might be: It's good to be the king... well, mostly. Sure, Steve Buscemi's Nucky Thompson — Atlantic City treasurer, power broker and bootlegger supreme — is awash in money, power and glamour, but his day-to-day existence is a never-ending game of whack-a-mole, with egos to stroke, law enforcement threats to evade and scores to settle.
After the first three mind-blowing seasons of Damages, nothing should come as a surprise. But all the backstabbing and mayhem we've seen still doesn't quite prepare us for the scene being shot today at the show's Brooklyn soundstages: Glenn Close's Patty Hewes gazing tenderly into a child's eyes. OK, now we're shocked! Turns out Patty is the guardian of her granddaughter. The hard-charging lawyer gained custody after ensuring the child's mother was jailed for statutory rape and her father, Patty's son, Michael (Zachary Booth), seemingly tried to run his mom down and went on...
Why are we so thankful for FX's new boxing drama Lights Out — a rock 'em, sock 'em respite from the midwinter doldrums? Let us count the ways.1. Everybody loves a comeback.We meet 40-year-old Patrick "Lights" Leary (Holt McCallany) five years after a catastrophic title bout. The consequences of that event have left him financially, physically and existentially at sea. And while a return to the ring could mean disaster on every front, McCallany notes ...
He plays Boardwalk Empire's federal agent Nelson Van Alden, whose job — crusade might be a better word for it — is to enforce newly enacted Prohibition in Atlantic City. Good luck with that! Where you've seen him His stunning, Oscar-nominated turn as Leonardo DiCaprio's mentally disturbed yet eerily insightful neighbor in 2008's Revolutionary Road. He's currently delivering a tour de force as a desperate producer in off-Broadway's Mistakes Were Made.
On the eve of tonight's contentious Blue Bloods episode (10/9c, CBS), in which a terrorist threat finds the Reagan brood — a family of New York City cops and lawyers headed by Tom Selleck's patriarch, police chief Frank — at loggerheads over racial profiling, the TV icon sat down for a chat about his current and past alter egos...
Three faces of Boardwalk Empire grace a photo studio in Manhattan's meatpacking district on a sunny Saturday: Gretchen Mol is glowing, not only because she's expecting her second child, but because her makeup's done and she now sits rosy-hued as her stylist affixes fiery-red extensions to her blonde locks. Michael Pitt, the very image of laconic Hollywood cool in his gelled locks and pinstripes, lounges on a sofa languidly strumming his acoustic guitar. Finally, a haggard Steve Buscemi shuffles in. He's here on two hours sleep, having worked till 4am directing an episode of Nurse Jackie. He plops down, takes one look at the tape recorder ...
True to form, Rescue Me's penultimate episode ended with a shocking cliff-hanger: During a raging casket-warehouse fire, Lou (John Scurti) remained pinned under a mass of shelving and a chunk of the ceiling fell onto a helmet-less Damien (Michael Zegen). So, then: Just how many deaths will the finale hold? Exec producer Peter Tolan assures us that tragedy is indeed in the offing....
So much for "First, do no harm..." On tonight's episode of the FX laffer about divorced-with-kids comic Louis C.K. (11/10c, FX), our hero gets way more than he bargained for in a rip-roaring visit to his doctor—guest star Ricky Gervais!—an old high-school pal whose examination consists of a barrage of bodily insults and terrifying diagnoses...
Watching Vincent D'Onofrio's Det. Robert Goren on Law & Order: Criminal Intent (Sundays at 9 pm/ET, USA) is a deliciously unsettling experience. We love the awkward mannerisms, the halting yet penetrating speech, the craned neck bend he performs when grilling suspects. He's brilliant, insightful, riveting. But, frankly, he seems a few sandwiches short of a picnic, if you know what we mean…. For example: In "Untethered," D'Onofrio's last episode before the writers' strike, Goren went undercover in a mental ward to expose prisoner abuse. Instead, he fell prey to the sadistic mind games and emerged from the ordeal near-catatonic. In the first post-strike episode, "Purgatory," the suspended Goren got reinstated, but we never witnessed the psych evaluation that was required to get his shield and gun back. This was no acci
Grant Show flashes back to the '70s with the sleeper hit Swingtown (Thursdays at 10 pm/ET, CBS). We caught up with him for a quick chat. TV Guide: As a '70s wife-swapper in CBS' Swingtown, you spend a lot of time half-dressed. Does that create any awkwardness on the set?Grant Show: No, but I'm telling you, I have to go to the gym all the time now! I thought I was done with that! As a matter of fact, as soon as I'm done talking to you, I'm going to the gym. TV Guide: God bless ya! Here's a burning question: Is the mustache real?Show: Yeah. I've had it since February of last year. I get some funny looks. Recently I was sitting at a restaurant here in Hollywood and a couple of girls who I didn't know were talking with us, and one of them leaned over to my buddy and asked, "Is your friend a porn star?" It's
Apparently playing one of TV's most challenging characters — The Wire's hard-drinking, corner-cutting Baltimore detective Jimmy McNulty — wasn't challenge enough for Dominic West. "I've been dying to direct," the British actor says. "HBO, thank goodness, took a chance on me." The gamble was worth it: West's episode, "Took," in which McNulty's plot to secure funds for the police department by concocting a serial killer of homeless men spins out of control, debuts this Sunday, Feb. 17 (9 pm/ET, HBO), and it's pitch-perfect. We asked the aspiring auteur to take us through some of its more challenging scenes. THE SCENE: Show of ForceSquad cars, helicopters and boats swarm the Seaport in search of the "killer." "I can't tell you how exciting that was! It wasn't written that there'd actually be helicopters and stuff. I asked for
During its first four seasons, HBO's The Wire (Sundays, 9 pm/ET, HBO) has tackled some major issues: inner-city crime, labor conflicts, political corruption, the failing public-school system. And as it launches its final 10-week run, the sprawling drama clearly still has a lot of big questions on its mind. In a jaw-dropping twist at the end of this season's second episode, Baltimore detective Jimmy McNulty (Dominic West) resorts to desperate measures in an attempt to restart a hard-fought case against drug kingpin Marlo Stanfield (Jamie Hector). Suffice it to say, his tactics would give Gil Grissom conniption fits. "It's not about how the unit tracks Marlo down," West says. "It's about how McNulty goes after him despite the authorities." Those authorities include the ci
We're thrilled that Ricky Gervais is resurrecting his bloody genius HBO series Extras for a one-shot finale this week, but we can't help feeling dejected. Soon, Extras will be gone for good. Here's what we'll miss most. (The Extras series finale airs Sunday, Dec. 16, at 9 pm/ET on HBO.) Extras features TV's most delightfully dysfunctional duoThat would be Gervais' serious-actor wannabe Andy Mill­man and his idiotic agent, Darren Lamb (Gervais' col­laborator, Steven Merchant). In creating the duo's mad­dening attempts at commu­nication, Gervais harkened back to comedy's legendary mismatched duo Laurel and Hardy. "They nailed it," Gervais says simply. It showcases TV's sweet­est relationship "People know that she's vulnerable, because she's a bit stupid," Gervais says of Andy's best friend, Maggie (Ugly Betty's Ashley Jensen). Particularly refreshing is the absence of will
TV Guide caught up with Jerry Seinfeld in the middle of all the buzz about his latest release, Bee Movie, hitting theaters today. TV Guide: Are you psyched that your animated film, Bee Movie, is finally coming to a theater near us? Jerry Seinfeld: This was a big life experience for me — and it's been going on for four years. I didn't plan it that way. I thought I was just going to write it and give it to DreamWorks and they would make it. But then I got involved in how it got made, and it just went on down the wormhole.TV Guide: I don't think anyone expected that your next project would be an animated movie about bees….Seinfeld: The fact that it was something different really attracted me. All new toys, all new clay to play with, all new tech­nology. It sort of woke me up
With its season finale airing tonight, TV Guide lays out the top reasons Mad Men (10 pm/ET, AMC) is the show to watch. 1) The enigma that is Don Draper. He has matinee-idol looks, power and creative genius. Plus, he's a philanderer, a liar and god knows what else. What are we supposed to feel for this guy — contempt? Envy? Compassion? Yes, yes and yes, and never more so than by the end of the Oct. 18 season finale. Matthew Weiner, creator of AMC's sleeper hit, promises, "We will like him more. Don [Jon Hamm] is asking himself if he wants to separate from everything that is his humanity. He knows on some level he's a fraud, and you'll see him trying to have feelings." 2) Location, location, location! The marble lobby of Menken's department store, the dingy Deelite Coffee S
There'll be no Pez dispensers, puffy shirts or Junior Mints in sight. Still, the Emmy-winning 30 Rock's Oct. 4 season premiere (8:30/ET) will seem like a trip back in time as Jerry Seinfeld returns to Must-See TV for a sidesplitting one-night stand. Fans have Seinfeld's upcoming animated feature, Bee Movie, to thank for the comedic legend's return to Thursday night. While Seinfeld was working on NBC promos for the flick, network cochairman Ben Silverman asked the comic if he'd be interested in appearing on 30 Rock. Jerry was all over the idea. "I like Tina Fey. I think she's very bright. I like the whole vibe," Seinfeld says. "So I thought, 'Yeah, I could see myself on that show.'" But here's what really sealed the deal: "I'm a gigantic fan of
We can't say he didn't warn us. Before his new AMC drama Mad Men premiered last month, former Sopranos executive producer Matthew Weiner said, "There will hopefully be a ‘Holy s--t!' moment in each episode." Three weeks in, he's holding up his end of the deal, as the show reveals the amoral underbelly of perfect-on-the-surface protagonist Don Draper (Jon Hamm). Set in New York City in 1960, Mad Men (airing Thursdays at 10 pm/ET) slickly re-creates a topflight Madison Avenue advertising agency and its ruthless, ego-driven players. You can practically smell the Brylcreem, whiskey and cigarettes as the bright, sexy characters look sharp and crack wise. But all is not well underneath those sharkskin suit
Over the course of a dazzling career, Glenn Close has played eccentric (The World According to Garp), diabolical (Dangerous Liaisons) and charming (as Homer's mom on The Simpsons). But in her new role as mercurial, high-powered attorney Patty Hewes in FX's legal drama Damages (premiering tonight at 10 pm/ET), she hits all those notes — and then some. "She's a woman at the top of her own law firm, who has no peer within her company," Close says. "I'm not sure that's been done before." In Damages' mind-bending first episode, Hewes is quickly shown to be "the sharpest person in the room," Close says. V
FX's Rescue Me (Wednesdays at 10 pm/ET) once again reminded its fans to expect the horribly unexpected, as its June 27 episode concluded with the gunshot suicide of firehouse chief Jerry Reilly. But the plot turn was downright devastating for Jack McGee, the actor who played the gruff, lovable chief. Speaking to TV Guide in March during his last day on set, McGee alleged that the decision to off his character derived from an unnamed animus from the show's star and executive producer, Denis Leary. He claims the two were once close but that in recent years Leary had barely spoken to him off camera. "I don't know what I did to him," McGee says. What's worse, he added, is that Leary didn't break the news personally. "He handled it
