Stories

Great comedies? Burrows molded most of them

James Burrows (shown here), who died Friday at 85, was the master of TV comedy.
His work sprawled from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” to the”Big Bang Theory” pilot and beyond. He propelled the “must-see” age of “Friends” and “Frasier” and such. He did it all.
Well, almost all. “I passed on both ‘Seinfeld’ and ‘Designing Women,'” he wrote. “I didn’t see the potential of either at the time. It happens.”
But mostly, he saw potential and expanded it. He was “one of the great comedy directors in television,” wrote Brandon Tartikoff, the former NBC chief. He was “the most successful director in television comedy — ever,” wrote Warren Littlefield, Tartikoff’s successor. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / June 21, 2026

Stories

Music, masses and fireworks: TV’s set for the 4th

On the July 4 weekend, it seems, all Americans will simultaneously be:
— Partying outdoors, with music and fireworks and such; and
— Sitting at home, watching music and fireworks and such.
At least, that’s the plan, as networks set massive 250th-birthday plans.
Fireworks? NBC will be in New York, as usual … CBS and Fox News will be in Washington, D.C. … ABC and its cable and streaming chanels will be in Nashville and Disneyland …PBS will be in Colonial Williamsburg — a day after many of its stations are at Mount Vernon.
Music? You’ll find lots of country stars — Reba McEntire, Blake Shelton, Trace Adkins, Tim McGraw, Clint Black, etc. — plus others, including Post Malone, Bebe Rexha, Ne-Yo, Jon Batiste, Kelli O’Hara and Judy Collins.
Here are the plans, with details pending; all are for the 4th, except where noted. We’ll start with the networks that have been doing this every year: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / June 19, 2026

Stories

No build-up needed: “Dragon” is in battle mode

Amid all the “Games of Thrones” extremes, all the sex and spectacle and such, a pattern emerged.
Viewers got used to “a slow build and then there’s an explosion — maybe midway through and then certainly near the end” of a season, said Ryan Condal, writer-producer of “House of the Dragon” (shown here) a “Thrones” prequel.
That’s what makes the third “House” season such a surprise: It starts (9 p.m. Sunday, June 21, on HBO and HBO Max) in full battle mode.
“I think it’s going to put people back on their heels,” Condal said, in a Zoom press conference. “It just comes out so heavy and unexpectedly.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / June 17, 2026

Stories

You think it’s bleak now? Just wait

After the first couple “Vampire Lestat” episodes, we’d be tempted to call the show bleak. Or grim or downbeat or such.
Lestat, after all, is a rock-and-roller (shown here) who doesn’t just rip up hotel rooms after the show. He also rips up bodies, barely survives an attack and reflects on his tortured childhood, 130 years ago.
But hey, that was just a warm-up. From here, said Sam Reid (who stars), “it gets pretty bleak.”
Rolin Jones — who created this show, which continues the two seasons of “Interview With The Vampire” — agreed. Starting with the third episode (9 p.m. June 21, on AMC), “it’s going to get about as dark as we’ve ever gone.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / June 14, 2026

Stories

Yes, crime world has room for savvy veterans

Even in a show about a young drug dealer, there’s room for wizened character and veteran actors.
Consider “Power Book III: Raising Kanan,” which starts its fifth and final season at 8 p.m. Friday on Starz. The show began with a teen druglord-wannabe; still, it also has room for people who have done Shakespeare, Broadway and situation comedies, including:
— Tony Danza, 75, who began doing sitcoms almost a half-century ago. Now he’s a Mafia godfather.
— Wendell Pierce, 65, who jumps between Shakespeare’s “Othello” onstage and a good-nature police captain in “Elsbeth.” Now he plays what he calls “just one of the coolest, most laidback gangsters in South Jamaica, Queens.”
— And Patina Miller (shown here), 41. She’s been a vibrant musical-theater star on Broadway and in London. Now she plays what Pierce calls “a character we’ve never seen before — a Black woman leading a crime family.” Read more…

By Mike Hughes / June 7, 2026

Stories

Summer streamers push us to old and new worlds

As June arrives, we start scrambling around the TV universe.
Broadcast networks are sinking into a summer of reruns and reality. If we want more … well, that’s why the world invented streaming and cable.
Some shows, listed below, offer the full range. One (“Little House on the Prairie”) takes us back to the frontier; others — including new “Simpsons” episodes and a “Big Bang Theory” spin-off (shown here) — fling us into alternate worlds.
There are shows produced by Barack Obama (who was elected president) and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson (who was arrested, as a teen, for drug-dealing) and Mindy Kaling (who was Kelly in “The Office”).
In short, there’s a lot. This sampling leans heavily on the start of the summer, with more announcements expected. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / May 31, 2026

Stories

Late-night: Networks coveted it; CBS abandoned it

Strolling through a broadcast museum recently, I was struck by:
1) The immense role of late-night TV; and
2) How odd it is that CBS shed its late-night role. By dumping Stephen Colbert, it abandoned a slot it had struggled to get.
For CBS, late-night had long been a serious void. It was the “empty piece of the jigsaw puzzle that’s glared at us over the decades,” Howard Stringer, the network president, once told reporters.
That void was filled by David Letterman in 1993 and then by Colbert in 2015. For 33 years, CBS had a piece of what NBC has had almost forever. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / May 28, 2026

Stories

Brooke faces the big questions — murder, technology and Canadian niceness

It’s time to probe two of life’s persistent stereotypes:
A) Older folks have trouble keeping up with modern times; and B) Canadians are really, really nice.
Our guides (via a Zoom interview) are Brooke Shields, 60, and Amalia Williamson, 31. They star in “You’re Killing Me” (shown here), the “cozy mystery” series that streams new episodes Mondays at www.acorn.tv. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / May 21, 2026

Stories

Summer TV: sports, games, a few dramas and more

The summer TV season looms, bringing a little of this, a little of that and a lot of sports.
A lot. Basketball has staked out June 3-19 on ABC; baseball has Saturdays on Fox and Sundays on NBC. And this year, Fox obsesses on soccer’s World Cup, from June 11 to July 19.
Around that, however, there’s room for a modest number of non-reruns, including (shown here” NBC’s “Surviving Earth.”
The streamers will keep pouring out new shows, year-round. (Netflix, for instance, has its promising “Little House on the Prairie” reboot July 9.) But for this overview, we’ll look at the five major broadcast networks.
Most of the big summer shows are back (“America’s Got Talent,” “Big Brother,” “Family Feud,” etc.), except for the troubled “Bachelorette.” Fox started two of the best shows — “The 1% Club” and “MasterChef” — early. Also, PBS has its Sunday dramas, plus lots of documentaries, new and old.
Added to that are three new series. We’ll start there: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / May 18, 2026

Stories

250th celebration adds music, fireworks, more

For public-TV, America’s 250th-birthday celebration has added a key step.
Now it will be a “weekend celebration.”
Previously scheduled on PBS was the tentatively titled “America Made in Virginia: 250 Years Together,” on Saturday, July 4. Now the night before has “A Capitol Fourth” (shown here in a previous year) including a new song (“American Made”) from Trace Adkins and fireworks above George Washington’s Mount Vernon home.
Yes, that means this “Fourth” event will actually be on the third, but that’s nothing new: Through its 37 years, “The National Memorial Day Concert” has been on the eve of the holiday; now “Capitol Fourth,” from the same producers, will do the same.
Those two events help bookend the public-TV celebration: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / May 14, 2026