Review of 2-26-2000 episode (MD-518; some spoilers)

This review can also be found at:

        http://www.nic0lesullivan.org/md518.txt

"Talk to Me" wrapped up taping for the year late on Friday (February 25).
I don't know much about the show yet, but it's going to be on ABC starting
April 11 at 9:30 (EST) after "Dharma and Greg." The initial order is for
five episodes. I think it is established in the first episode that
Sullivan is Sedgwick's sister. In the show, Kyra Sedgwick plays a
radio talk show host, the show is split half and half between the main
characters professional life and her personal life, with Sullivan appearing
essentially only in the scenes dealing with the character's personal life.
One of the good gimmicks about the show is that since the main character
is a talk show host, it provides a good excuse for bringing in special
guest stars; e.g. Gene Simmons is the guest one week and Dr. Joyce
Brothers appears in another episode. I plan to have a page on my web site
devoted to the show which I will create when I have time. Overall, it
doesn't sound like ground-breaking comedy, but the show benefits
from good writing and an excellent ensemble cast.

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Malcolm X in the Middle: This parody is a "Malcolm in the Middle"/Malcolm X
crossover. Malcolm X (Aries Spears) is an insufferable child in a white
family (Mo Collins, Michael McDonald and extras). The idea seems pretty
original - it's not something that would come to most people on the spur
of the moment - and they seem to have replicated many of the elements
of "Malcolm in the Middle" - e.g. siblings eating boogers and parents
at the table in various states of undress - while juxtapositioning it
with the politically-charged rhetoric of the Black Muslims. It's not
outright hilarious, but it will likely raise a dry smile.

Paul Timberman's Workshop: This is the fourth installment of this exemplar
of gross-out humor. He's here to advertise the Wonder Tool 2000, "the
last tool you'll ever buy." He pokes out his eye with a corkscrew and then
blows off his head with a flare gun. This segment has the advantage of
not being used very often (although most recurring characters have been
used less frequently this season). The part where he pokes out his eye was
probably the funniest; this was not quite as funny as the previous
"Paul Timberman" segments but was OK.

Lorraine: Lorraine (Mo Collins) goes to an all-you-can-eat buffet in Las
Vegas; Michael McDonald is of course the person who has to put up with
her. In the end, he quits and she gets to have the buffet without even
paying for it. This is pretty much Lorraine-by-numbers; even though
they were clearly going for laughs here, I didn't find it too humorous,
except towards the end when she eats the jalapeno pepper. And the
segment drags on a bit too long, a complaint that is becoming increasingly
redundant.

Law and Order Audition Tape: Nicole Sullivan and Michael McDonald want
to be on "Law and Order," but they aren't perceived as dramatic actors,
although both are classically-trained dramatic actors. In order
to help change the producers' perception of their acting abilities,
Sullivan and McDonald have put together an audition tape in which they
play a variety of "Law and Order"-type roles: e.g. hooker, Bronx
cabdriver, good cop, bad cop, etc. We also see footage of Sullivan
and McDonald fighting and Sullivan playing with her dog After the tape is
shown, Sullivan is optimistic that the tape might be made acceptable with
some editing, but this is not possible since McDonald has already sent in
the tape. This is another low-budget segment, like the one that took place at
the Billboard Music Awards, and this one was not brilliantly conceived
(though it wasn't a bad idea). Of course, the viewer doesn't have to suspend
disbelief very much for this segment: I don't know much about McDonald's
background, but it is clearly true that Sullivan is a classically-trained
dramatic actress. The funniest thing about this segment was the portrayal of
Sullivan as essentially domineering and bossy; in the beginning when
she asserts that she thinks "Law and Order" is better than "Mad TV,"
McDonald says that he agrees, even though he said the contrary thirty
seconds earlier - and most of the fighting is Sullivan yelling at
McDonald. But the problem with these segments is that they literally
make the show look like a cross between VH1's "Before They Were Rock
Stars" and a public access channel. Moreover, it makes it look as if
the writing staff took a holiday. Still, this segment had its moments;
I got a good laugh when the Saucy Medical Examiner #1 (Sullivan) announces
that the victim "got lucky" (i.e., she found semen). And the appearance
of Sullivan for the first time since MD-515 is noteworthy in itself,
even though the material wasn't the strongest. And it goes without saying
that watching this segment is far less painful than watching a Stuart
sketch.

Bar Fightin': A belligerent man at a bar (Michael McDonald) picks fights
with everyone there; when he finally "fights" one patron (Will Sasso),
his fighting technique consists of clawing ineffectively at his opponent
and falling to the ground. Still, his girlfriend (Mo Collins) seems
impressed. This kind of reminds me of the "Kids in the Hall" sketches
with the small fight guy (Bruce McCulloch) - especially the second
sketch where McCulloch picks a fight with the cashier in a pizzeria
(played by Kevin McDonald) in spite of the cashier's attempts to
avoid a fight. Finally, McCulloch rushes towards him; McDonald raises an
aluminum pan to protect himself and McCulloch rushes straight into
it - and falls to the ground, unconscious. It is not necessarily true
that "Mad TV" was copying KITH - the belligerent fighting guy is
almost a stock figure, a scene-a-faire in sketch comedy, although
the similarities are striking. Admittedly, this sketch had some good
moments, although it was not nearly as funny as the KITH sketches (part of
the humor there came from the fact that this guy really thought he
could take on someone over seven feet tall, even after he keeps getting
beaten up). And there was certainly not enough humor here to justify
the length of this sketch. Still, the midget at the end was a nice touch.

Ms. Swan: And in the Complete Waste of Time Category, we have this
Ms. Swan segment. Ms. Swan, having survived her fall in the airport,
hails a cab (driven by Tony Shaloub); he recognizes her as the "hero
of the revolution;" the two quickly fall in love, and this quickly
segues into a sappy romantic sequence in the cab. It's interesting how
they have tried to link together all the Swan sketches this season, but
it has very little comedic value. The Carpenters song parody (at least
I think it was supposed to be a Carpenters song parody; they may have
changed the melody a little to avoid copyright infringement issues but
it's essentially the same) chiefly had the effect of reminding me
of a much funnier Carpenters song parody that Howard Stern did when
"The Karen Carpenter Story" came out almost twelve years ago: "I lose
my lunch/In a few big chunks/And throw up on you" (to the tune of
"Close to You"). And that's where my mind was, reminiscing about that
comedic moment, and trying not to think too much about this Swan
sketch.

The Cure: The Cure performs "Maybe Someday" off their latest album.
I'm still having a problem evaluating these musical segments.
I know I was never a fan of The Cure, even when they were all the
rage (when "Killing an Arab" was released). Yet in these week in
which the music industry gave itself a pat on the back, I at least saw
an example of a musical segment that was bad in an unqualified sense:
while eating dinner, I saw a rerun of "Saturday Night Live" from
about two years ago with Jimmy Page and Puff Daddy performing "Kashmir."
I think this was on the Godzilla soundtrack, which would explain
how it was released in the first place, all kinds of bad music seem
to find their way onto soundtrack albums. This is not to say that the
original "Kashmir" was anything to write home about, essentially a
two minute song padded out to nine minutes, but this was ten times
worse. What I'm trying to say here is that this segment was not as bad
as the one I described, but I'm still waiting for the producers to
book a real rock band on the show (KISS doesn't count; not only didn't
they perform, but a band whose main claim to fame is copying Alice Cooper's
stage act doesn't count in my estimation). In the interim, though, this
will do. But I hope that musical guests are somewhat less frequent
one February sweeps is over.

Touched By An Atheist: Della Reese and Roma Downey (Debra Wilson, Mo
Collins) have succeeded in convincing a sick man (Michael McDonald)
to change his ways - until George Carlin appears and convinces him
that there is no God with a variation on the "If there's a God, why
is there so much suffering in the world" argument. Then we see a preview
from next week's episode in which Carlin convinces the Pope (Will Sasso)
that he's been living a lie. This is funnier than it sounds, and the
presence of Carlin elevates the show to a higher level. [Carlin is
an unusual figure, someone who doesn't always work clean, yet who
is above using obscenity to milk a cheap laugh.] Carlin is not
pushing the envelope here, but even his routine stuff is more than a
cut above the prosaic fare the show has aired in the last few weeks.
In my opinion, this was easily the best segment in the show.

Closing Segment: The Cure returns to do one more song as the credits
roll. This was pretty good; at least they crammed as much entertainment
as possible into the forty-three minutes.
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Even the presence of The Cure (surely a favorite of many who came
of age in the 1980's or early 1990's), George Carlin and the return of
Nicole Sullivan could not save this episode. Since it was a sweeps
episode, evidently the producers made an effort, especially with Mad
TV's ratings purportedly higher than ever. Unfortunately, they also
chose this week to pile on some of the weakest material ever, with
the exception of the George Carlin piece towards the end. This show
was not a total disaster, but it still comes across as one of the
weakest of the season. (4/10)

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