Mike Hughes on TV

It may soon be clear that I think "Smash" is one of the best shows in TV history. It has it all -- passion, pain, characters worth caring about, splendid visuals and great music. Here's the story I sent to papers:

By MIKE HUGHES

For NBC – often ignored, sometimes
mocked – this is new: Suddenly, it has our attention.

On Sunday, it had the Super Bowl and the
season-opener of “The Voice.”  Tonight (Monday, Feb. 6) brings more “Voice” and
then the debut of “Smash,” a show that seems to have
everything.

“We're working with the best of the
best,” Anjelica Huston said.

She's an Oscar-winner, the
daughter and grand-daughter of other Oscar-winners, yet she's overlooked here: Steven Spielberg is producer and the show –
about creating a Broadway musical – is stuffed with people who know the turf. “There are so many people here that come from this world,”
said Megan Hilty, one of the stars. “That keeps it very authentic.”

She has starred in two Broadway musicals
– “Wicked” (taking over as Glinda) and “9 to 5.” Other
“Smash” people have done more.

The original songs from"Smash" are by Marc
Shaiman and Scott Wittman, Tony-winners for “Hairspray.” The
scripts are by Theresa Rebeck, a Broadway playwright. The producers
include Neil Meron and Craig Zadan, Tony-nominees. Other Broadway
people are there for costumes, choreography and more.

And for all of that, “Smash” still depends on two young actresses, competing to portray Marilyn Monroe.

The characters are opposites: Hilty,
30, plays Ivy Lynn, blonde and brassy and a Broadway veteran;
Katharine McPhee Karen Cartwright, a waitress from Iowa, brunette and
introspective.

Their voices are also opposite.
"I think of myself as
more of a pop artist," said McPhee, the former "American Idol" runner-up, "and Megan has got, like, the big Broadway
voice."

Now they play opposites, facing all the detours -- waitressing, rude auditions, lecherous directors and more -- that may seem like cliches.

"The stereotype is there
for a reason," said McPhee, who has (like her character) worked in a restaurant.

There are intense emotions among theater people, Hilty said. "You’re exposing yourself in front of thousands of people. (It) sets the stage for high drama. The adrenaline’s going and the stakes are so high."

It's an ideal setting for drama. Spielberg -- who has produced a couple Broadway plays and seen his movie ("Catch Us If You Can") become a Broadway musical -- suggested the idea to Bob Greenblatt, then head of Showtime.

Rebeck remembers reading about that. "I had been interested in doing a show like this for a lot of years," she said. "And my agent kept saying, 'Don't even bother.'"

Then Greenblatt was hired to run NBC and took "Smash" with him. Spielberg assembled Rebeck and the others.

First, they had to decide what the musical would be about. Shaiman and Wittman suggested old movies; Rebeck went another way.

"I actually have a Ph.D. in Victorian literature and
so I know all these Victorian novels that would make great
musicals," she said. "I had a lot of ideas about feathers and sword
fights." 

Then Wittman suggested Monroe, who could be an ideal subject. "Her story is one of tragedy, heartbreak,
glamour, love -- all things that make for great drama," Hilty said.

There were doubts: Back in 1983, "Marilyn: An American Fable" died after two weeks on Broadway.

That argument became part of the show. One songwriter (Debra Messing) doubts a "Marilyn" musical, her writing partner (Christian Borle) kind of likes it. A producer (Huston) loves it and talks a talented director (Jack Davenport) into helping.

And then the idea sweeps ahead -- through workshops, auditions and the painful choice between opposite Marilyns. Along the way, there are chances to leap between versions.

We see the same song in a simple, rehearsal-hall production and (in the minds of the people) in grand spectacle. We see it performed by Hilty, by McPhee, by both.

We see a musical that might, eventually, really reach Broadway. And we see a TV show that could be a smashing success.

-- "Smash," 10 p.m. Mondays, NBC, beginning Feb. 6

-- NBC has also tentatively set a rerun for 8 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11

This is the plus side of NBC's recent troubles: It's allowed room for a show like "Who Do You Think You Are?"

A well-made show that tracks people's roots, "Who" has little ratings potential. Still, on Friday its starts its third (and longest) mini-season, this time with a dozen episodes.

That starts with Martin Sheen. Here's a short story I sent to papers:

By MIKE HUGHES

For many of his 71 years, Martin Sheen
has juggled distant backgrounds.

He's Spanish. His real name is Ramon
Estevez; his son (known as Charlie Sheen) is Carlos Estevez.

He's also Irish, but he's never learned
to speak Gaellic (“that is a very difficult language”) or
Spanish. His life has been kind of busy, with acting and a long
string of social causes and protests.

Now he's searched his roots for the
season-opener of “Who Do You Think You Are?” He promptly found
links with uncles on both sides. “Both of them had risen up against
oppression … and had suffered mightily for it,” Sheen said, “but
stuck to principles.” They were:

– Michael Fieland. He fought in the
Irish war of independence and then fought in the Irish civil war,
opposing the Irish Free State that was created in a British
compromise.

– Matias Estevez. He “fought
against Franco at the onset of the (Spanish) coup and spent an awful
lot of time in jail and, in fact, received a life sentence,” Sheen
said

Matias was eventually paroled and later
pardoned. Sheen – who has often been arrested and jailed during
protests – feels he's a kindred spirit.

“Maybe this is some unknown quality
that I have possessed,” h said. “Not to the extent that these
gentlemen did, because they were absolutely heroic.”

Not everyone in his past was heroic.
Don Diego Francisco Suarez, born in 1713, had a wife, a mistress, six
illegitimate children and a moralistic streak.

“He was a bit of a dandy and he was a
judge … and he prosecuted a young lady for a moral crime, if you
will.” Sheen said. And that woman is on another side of Sheen's
Spanish family tree.

“So my great, great, great
grandfather prosecuted my great, great, great grandmother,” Sheen
said.

It's the kind of surprise he found when
he could really explore his distant roots.

– “Who Do You Think You Are?” 8
p.m. Fridays, NBC

– Third season begins with Charlie
Sheen on Feb.3, Marisa Tomei on Feb. 10

– The first two seasons had only
seven and eight episodes; this one has 12

– Others include a cook (Paula Deen),
a football star (Jerome Bettis) and actors – Edie Falco, Helen
Hunt, Rashida Jones, Rob Lowe, Reba McEntire, Jason Sudeikis, Blair
Underwood and Rita Wilson.

Black History Month starts today, bringing a fresh cascade of shows. Here's the story and list I sent to papers:

By MIKE HUGHES

Each February, two strong forces –
PBS and cable – propel Black History Month.

This year's shows range from the upbeat
and uptempo – a Cab Calloway profile (Feb. 27), a vibrant
production of the Tony-winning musical “Memphis” (Feb. 24) – to
the dead-serious.

One upcoming PBS special (Feb. 13)
views methods that virtually revived the slavery early in the 20^th
century. “I learned about all of the cruelty and the abuse that was
handed out by my family,” said Susan Tuggle Burnore, whose
great-grandfather was convicted of killing 11 blacks. “It was
devastating.”

Another (Feb. 9) is a “Black Power
Mixtape” from an angry era. Angela Davis – in prison, charged
with aiding a 1970 murder – is shown passionately disputing that
black-power people are violent.

Davis was acquitted and is 68, a
retired University of California, Santa Clara professor. “Those of
us who were active … were often represented as advocates of
violence,” she said. She argues now that “the state had the
monopoly on violence …. I would love to inhabit a world without
violence.”

Such hours, sprinkled with cheerier
moments, fill February – even as people argue about whether there
should be a Black History Month.

Ironically, one of PBS' specials (Feb.
16) argues against Black History Month. “It's a film about trying
to see African-American history outside of the box of February,”
said filmmaker Shukree Tilghman.

Other people share some of his doubts.
“Are we ghettoizing the films by just giving them this one month?”
asked “Independent Lens” producer Lois Vossen, who has scheduled
three black-history films (including Tilghman's) for February.

Adds Talib Kweli, a “Mixtape”
narrator: “I remember being a little kid and McDonald's co-opted
Black History Month in a major way.”

Davis reflects some Black History Month
concerns. “There's a tendency to marginalize speakers and
activities in that frame.”

Still, society too often shed history.
Martin Luther King Day and Black History Month, Davis said,
are“preserving a way to encourage a collective meditation on the
history of struggle for freedom.”

That's how Sharon La Cruise sees it.
Her film (Feb. 2) basically starts the month for PBS. “I'm glad
there is a time ... focused on the history; I'm not sure we're
focused on any history in our country.”

Her film profiles Daisy Bates, who had
a powerful impact on the civil-rights movement in Little Rock, Ark.,
then was often overlooked … until Black History Month, 2012.

Here's a sampling:

PBS. (These are the national dates, but check local listings; on WKAR in East Lansing, for instance, each "Independent Len" is delayed until 11 p.m. the following Tuesday.)

– “Independent Lens” (10 p.m.
Thursdays): “Daisy Bates” profiles a civil rights leader in 1950s
Little Rock, Feb. 2; “The Back Power Mixtape 1968-1975” uses a
Swedish news team's footage of U.S. racial issues, Feb. 9; “More
Than a Month” questions having a Black History Month, Feb.16.

– “Underground Railroad: The
William Still Story”(10 p.m. Feb.6) views the role of a free black
man.

– “American Experience: Freedom
Riders” (8-10 p.m., Feb. 7) reruns an acclaimed documentary.

– “Slavery By Another Name”
(9-10:30 p.m. Feb.13) views Southern practices that revived slavery
by imprisoning blacks and then renting them to farmers.

– “Frontline: The Interrupters”
(9-10:30 p.m., Feb.14) views a Chicago program that has former gang
members heading off youth violence.

– “Great Performances: Memphis”
(9-11:30 p.m., Feb. 24) is the zestful, Tony-winning musical.

– “American Masters: Cab Calloway:
Sketches” (10-11 p.m. Feb. 27) profiles the singer/band leader.

BET

Yes, the channel is a piece of black
history itself. Some key specials this month include:

– “The Express” (2008, 8 p.m.
Feb. 4) portrays Ernie Davis, the first black Heisman Trophy winner.

– “Soul Mates: Dr. Maya Angelou and
Common” (11 a.m., Feb. 12) has two poets, one using hip hop.

– “BET Honors” (9 p.m. Feb. 13)
includes special awards for Angelou, the Tuskegee airmen, Stevie
Wonder, Spike Lee, Mariah Carey and coach Beverly Kearney.

– “Ali” (2001, 8 p.m., Feb. 24)
has Will Smith playing the champ.

Showtime

Documentary movies air at 8:30 p.m.
Thursdays:

– “Brooklyn Boheme” (Feb. 2)
views the rise of an artistic community in the 1980s.

– “On the Shoulders of Giants”
(Feb. 9) profiles the Harlem Renaissance, the first all-black
professional basketball team to win a national championship.

– “Heart of Stone” (Feb. 16)
views a crusading New Jersey principal.

Smithsonian Channel

– “MLK: The Assassination Tapes”
(9 p.m. Feb. 12) was assembled from footage that University of
Memphis professors created to document the garbage-workers strike
that drew King to the city.

– Two reruns air at 9 p.m. Saturdays,
rerunning at 8 p.m. Thursdays. “Seizing Justice: The Greensboro 4”
(Feb. 4) profiles the lunch-counter sit-ins; “Black Wings” (Feb.
11) has aviation pioneers.

More

Other shows are scattered around; a few
key ones include:

– “Men of Honor”(2000, 8 and 11
p.m. Feb.6, FX) has Cuba Gooding as the Navy's first black diver.

– “The Loving Story” (9-10:30
p.m. Feb. 14, HBO) portrays the husband and wife who were arrested in
1958, under Virginia's ban of inter-racial marriages. They eventually
won in the Supreme Court.

– Image Awards (8-10 p.m. Feb. 17,
NBC) annually assembles movie, TV and music stars and more.

– “Glory” (1989, 8-10:30 p.m.
Feb. 17), portrays the Army's first black regiment, in the Civil War.

Every now and then, a really good comedy show arrives. One of the best -- "Key & Peele" -- debuts Tuesday (Jan. 31) and reruns often. Here's the story I sent to papers:

By MIKE HUGHES

When listing Barack Obama's
accomplishments, this may not be near the top.

“Obama was the best thing for black
nerds everywhere,” Jordan Peele said.

Keegan-Michael Key – his colleague in
Comedy Central's new “Key & Peele” – agreed. Now, he said,
“it's OK for black people to walk down the street saying, 'Yeah,
Star Trek!'”

These two actor-comedians point to lots
of other inspirations, from “Mr. Show” to Monty Python, but one
stands out” “(Dave) Chapelle was a revelation to us,” Key said.

Now they're on Chapelle's old network,
doing what he did: They talk to a nightclub-type audience,
introducing stylish little films. “There's a cinematic quality to
the sketches,” Key said.

He and Peele have much in common, from
ethnic roots (black father, white mother) to their five years on
“MADtv.” Both have been on “Reno 911,” Chocolate News,”
“Children's Hospital” and “Al TV.”

Key is the taller one
(6-foot-2-and-a-half), the older one (40), the married one. He's the
Midwesterner who grew up in suburban Detroit and thrived in Chicago.
He's also the one with the theater degrees and awards. “Keegan is
an actor's actor,” said Peele, 32.

Peele is a NewYorker who is, among
other things, a master impersonator. Some sources say he auditioned
to play Obama on “Saturday Night Live,” but lost to Fred Armisen;
actually, Peele said, he was offered the job, but couldn't take it
because of another commitment.

A slow period followed, with
situation-comedy roles. Key was a regular (as Curtis) in CBS' “Gary
Unmarried”; Peele was in “The Station,” a Ben Stiller
production that Fox nixed.

“We were both free at the same time,”
Key said. “Our manager (asked): 'You guys want to work together?'”

Their highlight reel attracted Kent
Alterman, Comedy Central's programming chief. He says their chemistry
goes beyond similiarities. “It's also about their differences;
they're wired very differently.”

Peele's mother, an administrative
assistant, raised him alone in what he calls “the best
neighborhood” to grow up in, on New York's Upper West Side. It was
an artistic area, where Lady Gaga was also growing up; Peele says he
was “deceptively quiet; I was the artistic kid in the corner.”

Key was none of that. “I was a hyper,
hot mess,” he said.

His adoptive parents (bi-racial, like
his birth parents) gave him space. They “were social workers,”
Key said, “and all of their friends were clinical psychologists.
(It was,) 'Let him express himself.'”

He grew up in Southfield, was shy in
school for a while, then started auditioning for shows at Shrine
Catholic High School in Royal Oak. Then came the ssuccesses: He
graduated from Detroit University and added a Master of Fine Arts
from Penn State. In 1996, he co-founded Planet Ant, a comedy theater
in Hamtramck. He joined Chicago's Second City comedy troupe; in 2002
and in 2003, the Jefferson awards (Chicago's top theater prize) named
him best actor in a revue.

Next came “MADtv,” his friendship
with Peele, and their show. With a team of writers, they had about 10
weeks to write sketches and then a frantic 23 days to film all eight
episodes.

This started with 260 sketch ideas, Key
said; 51 will be squeezed into this first, eight-week season.

Alterman points to one notion: “Jordan
does an incredible Obama and Keegan is his anger translator.”

A “black nerd,” it seems, can
always use some verbal back-up.

– “Key & Peele,” 10:30 p.m.
Tuesdays, Comedy Central; debuts Jan.31, rerunning at 12:30 and 3a.m.

– Opener reruns often in the next
week, including Thursday at 10:30 p.m.; Friday at 9 p.m. and 12:30
a.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m., 8 p.m. and midnight; Feb. 7 at 8 p.m.

This is a huge weekend for TV. If you scan the recent blogs here, you'll see stories on Tony Bennett (Friday), a "Hallmark Hall of Fame" movie (Sunday) and Jennifer Granholm's new talk show (Monday).

There's one more story, however: Dr. Sanjay Gupta has a terrific report (Sunday, then rerunning the following Saturday) on football concussions. I'll put the story here in a moment, but first two recollections from my childhood in Clintonville, Wis.:

1) Freshman football: Mike Harris, the New London fullback, has the ball; I'm the middle linebacker, ready to tackle him. Mike, alas, was short and stocky; I was neither, making it difficult to get his waist. As we each ran full-speed, we collided head-on. The lights went out for a moment; I heard Gib Johnson, a math teacher, on the sidelines, saying "Do it again, Mike."

1a) I didn't do it again. They promptly ran the same play; I jumped on Mike's back and gradually wrestled him down.

1b) Gib Johnson, a former military man, later became Clintonville's mayor and tried, unsuccessfully, to bring the state's "superprison" to our town. I'm quite sure there were other times when I didn't follow his instructions.

2) In 4th grade, we were playing run-through. I collided head-on with my friend Mickey Nelson. Then the bell rang and we all ran inside. After a while, the teacher inquired: "Where's Mickey?" He was just out there playing with us a minute ago, we said. She went out to look and found him still lying on the ground.

In both cases, everyone survived and went on to productive lives. (Well, semi-productive; I write about television.) What we didn't realize was that either of those hits could have led to permanent damage, even death. It's only been in recent years that people havetake concussions seriously. Here's the story I sent to papers:

 By MIKE HUGHES

Dr. Sanjay Gupta grew up in a football
world of “The Big House,” the big games, the big hits.

People found elegance in young men
colliding head-on. “You'd hear phrases like 'getting his bell
rung,'” Gupta said. “Now people talk about concussions or what
they are – brain injuries.”

That's emphasized in his CNN special,
“Big Hits, Broken Dreams.”

Certainly, people have realized
concussions can be fierce. There have been more specifics lately,
however, partly because of a research “brain bank” with the
remains of pro football players and others.

“I look at a lot of brains in my
work, but I had never seen anything like this,” said Gupta, a
neuro-surgeon who visited the bank. “You would see a 17-year-old
with damage we associate with old age.”

So he focused on early concussions, in
high school football. That brought him to Greenville, N.C., which
Sports Illustrated once dubbed “Sports Town, USA.”

That's a setting Gupta can understand.
He's a first-generation American native who's from an academic family
– both parents were engineers for Ford – but he's always been
near football fervor.

He grew up in cities – Dearborn,
Livonia and Novi – within a half-hour of the University of
Michigan, where the stadium (nicknamed “The Big House”) has had
football attendance topping 114,000. He went to college and medical
school at U-M and has flown back for games.

“I'm still a big football fan,”
Gupta said. “I still love it.”

That's similar to the mood in
Greenville, where players' instincts are to shake it off and resume
action. “These kids want to play …. They want to get back in.”

In the past, they weren't aware of
secondary concussions: The brain works at healing itself from a blow;
a second blow, during that time, can have a harsher effect.

Jaquan Waller, a star running back,
took a head-on hit during practice in 2008. He was taken off the
field, but was back the next day, seeming upbeat.

“Everybody just thought he just got
his bell rung,” Zach Rogers, a friend and teammate, says in the
special. “Nothing out of normal. That's just how you play; you play
hurt.”

Two days after that blow, he was in a
game. After what seemed like an ordinary hit, he was carried off the
field. He was essentially dead by the time he got to the hospital,
officially dead the next morning.

Another North Carolina teen died from a
football injury that year and Gupta met Greenville players who have
had persistent headaches. He also found the flip side: Since Waller's
death, Greenville has intensely fought against concussions; steps
include talks to players, plus:

– Having an athletic trainer at
practices and a doctor on sidelines for games. The majority of
schools still don't have trainers at practice, Gupta said, but 35
states now have some sort of requirement,

– Testing players before the season.
To return after a concussion, they have to match that result.

– Paying attention to the cumulative
effects. A pro player, Gupta said, might absorb 650,000 blows before
retirement. Some of that can be changed by reducing full-contact
practices.

– “Big Hits, Broken Dreams,” on
CNN under the “Dr. Sanjay Gupta Reports” banner

– 8 p.m. Sunday (Jan. 29), repeating
at 11 p.m. and 2 a.m.

– Repeats at the same times the next
Saturday, Feb. 4