Roadies coming to @Showtime This Summer @Sho_Roadies #Roadies

ROADIES  cast coming to Showtime June 26th

Roadies has announced it will premiere June 26th on Showtime!!!!!

With Manhattan being cancelled on WGNA this couldn't have come at a better time. I know it is very different in subject matter and tone but I'll bet it will be high quality television and that's all I care about.

I have been dying to see this show since it was announced last year. It comes from writer director Cameron Crowe, who I love, and chronicles the life of the people who make the rock shows we love. If you've spent anytime back stage at a show you know there is a lot of story to tell there.

Starring Luke Wilson, Carl Gugino, and a great supporting cast including Luis Guzman.

They just released the trailer with a song by Eddie Vedder and quote by Tom Petty. ENJOY

Twin Peaks Season 3 coming to Showtime in 2016 #TwinPeaks @Sho_Network

The internet is all a"twitter" about the just announced third season of Twin Peaks coming to Showtime in 2016. It will be a limited series with just nine episodes.The scripts will all be written by David Lynch and Mark Frost and all the episodes will be directed by Lynch. WOO HOO!



While few details are publicly known I think Kyle Maclachlan's tweet makes it pretty clear he will be involved.

Better fire up that percolator and find my black suit :-) #Twinpeaks
— Kyle MacLachlan (@Kyle_MacLachlan) October 6, 2014

If, like me, you were a huge fan of the series when it originally aired but haven't seen it since, not to worry Showtime says they'll be reairing the original two seasons before the premiere of these new nine episodes.

In case you doubt my original fan status I'm including pictures of me and a friend outside of Seattle visiting some of the exteriors of the show. These were taken a few years after the show was, sadly, cancelled.

Waterfall in opening credit of Twin Peaks

Twin Peaks Coffee Shop for a damn fine cup o Joe

Sorry for the quality. These are from a time before digital cameras!

Finally, for the holidays, here is Twin Peaks' The 12 Days of Christmas. There were at least 2 Christmas' where this would actually be played (relentlessly) on all alternative radio stations.

New Cameron Crowe Scripted Show For Showtime @CameronCrowe @sho_network

I am super excited to hear that Showtime has given a pilot production order for a Cameron Crowe written comedy series titled ROADIES. Just in case you don't know Mr. Crowe has had a few successes with films like ALMOST FAMOUS, SINGLES, and FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH just to mention 3 decades.

This new comedy series will follow the goings on of a successful rock band tour as experienced by their faithful road crew, AKA roadies. Crowe will executive produce with Winnie Holzman (Huge, My So-Called Life, Wicked), who will serve as showrunner, and J.J. Abrams (Lost, Fringe, Person of Interest). So it's a loaded bench.

Sounds good, right?

I love all things Cameron Crowe so I'll be waiting for this pilot with bated breathe. Don't worry about missing it. I will be making a lot of noise about this one. I have everything crossed it comes out soon and can be my new obsession when MAD MEN takes it's final bow next spring.

It's like a weight has been lifted and I know excellent, fabulous serial TV will live on!

UPDATE 12-14-14

Christina Hendricks from Mad Men has been cast to star in ROADIES. Christina Hendricks will portray “Shelli,” the band’s production manager – Bill’s (Luke Wilson) ingenious work partner, tough, but privately emotional, married to her job… and scary-good at it. Luke Wilson (Old School, The Royal Tenenbaums), Imogen Poots (The Look of Love), Rafe Spall (One Day), Peter Cambor (NCIS: Los Angeles) and Academy Award® nominee Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider) were previously announced as stars of the ensemble cast. The one-hour comedy pilot will shoot in Vancouver in early 2015.

Showtime Homeland Season 3 and Marathon of 2

Credit:  Kent Smith/SHOWTIME

Homeland returns to Showtime this Sunday! Hooray for all of us that have been waiting to find out how things will unravel from here??? Congratulation to Claire Dane's for her Emmy win earlier this week for her work on last season.

If you haven't seen season 2 of Homeland or just can't quite remember all the twist and turns of last season, fear not. Showtime is running a Homeland marathon of seasons 2 beginning at noon on Saturday and Sunday.

So be sure to get all caught up in time for the main event. The premiere of Homeland season 3 Sunday night on Showtime. I've seen the first two episodes and Carrie is in "it" up to her neck as usual. How she will ever dig out of her current predicaments is unfathomable, but I can't wait to watch her attempt it.

Sunset Strip Documentary on Showtime

Friday August 16th at 8pm Showtime is premiering the documentary Sunset Strip by Hans Fjellstad. A feature length film, it tells the 100 year history of THE Sunset Strip from trade route to Rock and Roll.

I was too young for the 70s on The Strip but I did do a year or two there in the mid to late 80s. It was a wild place, full of music and everything that goes with it. I'm looking forward to seeing how this film covers it, and seeing all the history that went before, and finally what happens on the street that looks so quiet to me now. Probably because I'm in bed at 10 on weekends now days.

Homeland on Showtime

I know I am late to the Showtime series Homeland party, but I have to jump in late and say how great it is now. I had thought it would be like every cop show, where there is a new crime every week and Homeland security would solve it. But I couldn't have been more wrong.

Each episode unfolds more of a mystery that takes so many sharp turns it's difficult to accurately guess what will happen next. Luckily, I was able to get a copy of the first season and devoured it immediately. If you missed the first season too you have a full month till Homeland returns September 30th.

The DVD of season 1 comes out August 28th, so get it preordered and catch up. I promise you're gonna thank me.

Ray Donovan Coming to Showtime

Yesterday while attending The Showtime press tour I got a first look at Ray Donovan. A new show starring Liev (hubba hubba) Schreiber and Jon Voight. It is action pact with Liev playing a "cleaner" and Voight as his ex con father. The action will all take place in Los Angeles.

I'm sure it will be violent and full of sex. Which ordinarily doesn't do it for me, but this looks like it won't be,completely, gratuitous. Plus did I mention Liev Schreiber....

No premiere daet yet but I'll keep you posted. Weekly installments of Liev will be impossible to keep to myself.

Nurse Jackie & The Big C on Showtime

This Sunday Nurse Jackie and The Big C come back to Showtime. It makes for a busy Sunday night with Mad Men and The Good Wife. Just set your DVR to overdrive and you should be fine.

Nurse Jackie
Can't wait to see how Jackie manages sobriety. From the preview it looks like she's taking it to her and everyone elses limit, before she checks into rehab.

The Big C
How will Cathy deal with being the widow when all along we had all thought she would be the one to leave a widower?

It should make for two fascinating seasons.

I'll be tweeting along with the shows #NurseJackie and #TheBigC

The Big C Season 2 Finale

Tonight is the season 2 finale of The Big C on Showtime. With each episode I have a bit of anxiety, will she get sicker...Even more so with the season finale.
Hopefully, we will have some loose ends tied up a bit more happily than last week.
If the show stays true to the original plan, I think there will only be 2 more seasons, one for each season of the year. Hopefully we'll get more if it continues to be sooo successful.

TCA

I spent the majority of the last week at TCA, The Television Critic Association. This is a conference where all the TV networks do panels of their upcoming shows for all the television critics. I am not a member, yet, but a few of the networks invited me as their guest, Showtime, PBS, and Discovery. Unfortunately, AMC and TNT were not there this time.
There were lots of fun things that happened, like meeting Ken Burns (pictured above with me and Mar Vista Mom). He was talking about his upcoming PBS show the 10th Inning. I also screwed up my courage to ask Kenneth Branagh a question about his second season of Wallender, also for PBS.
Showtime highlights included The Big C, which I wrote about last week. It really is a great show. I've had a chance to see a few of the episodes. The other show that I'm anxious to see is Episodes with Matt LeBlanc. It looks very funny.
The Discovery Channels, Animal Planet, Planet Green, etc...of course had a myriad of great looking science, animal, and human interest shows that I'll be waiting impatiently for.
I'll be rolling out posts on all the great shows I got to see this week as they get closer to their premiere dates. Sorry again for being MIA last week. But as you can see I was really up to my eyeballs.

The Big C on Showtime Aug. 16

The Big C premieres on Showtime Monday, Aug 16th. It stars Laura Linney, as a women diagnosed with terminal cancer and how that effects her. I think this show is going to be so relatable for so many of us. At this point in my life, I have had several important people in my life go through cancer with good out comes and the worst possible for a couple too.

I love this thing that Linney said about how when this character is diagnosed she doesn't create a bucket list, she just wants to be the person she always wanted to be, but right now. I feel like that has been more my experience. People don't care about seeing the Eiffel Tower, they want to be the friend, parent, artist, whatever it is, they want to get that in before they're gone.

Linney's costars are Oliver Platt, as her husband, who I really love, and Gabourey Sibide, as a student. Cynthia Nixon will be joining the cast as Linney's wild college friend and Liam Neeson for at least one episode.

Hopefully, this show will be as good, funny, and emotionally poignant as I'm expecting.