These days, I'm more judicious. The lack of creativity in Hollywood has necessitated this. I look for just one new show that might interest me. And I adopt that show wholeheartedly, especially if I find it entertaining.
A bunch of years ago, a new show that I selected was "The Big Bang Theory." That worked out fairly well for them, didn't it?
About six Septembers ago, a new show that I selected was "The Middle." Smart move. It flies totally under the radar screen as perhaps the best sitcom on television. Sorry about that, "Modern Family."
Of course, I've had some bad picks as well. I latched onto the Broadway-based soap "Smash." It limped through two seasons. And, last year, I got involved in that "Hostages" drama with Toni Collette. Don't look for it. Long gone.
So, this TV season, the one that intrigued me was "Madam Secretary." I was curious to see just how much of Hillary Clinton's life would be mirrored here. Very little, I might add. And I knew it was shot in New York with a very Broadway-oriented supporting cast. There's Patina Miller who just won the Tony as the Leading Player in Pippin. Erich Bergen was just on the big screen in "Jersey Boys" and I also saw him as the male lead in the "Anything Goes" national tour. Plus the cast also sports Bebe Neuwirth and nobody can resist that. For all those reasons, I sampled the premiere episode.
And I have been back ever since.
Don't get me wrong. "Madam Secretary" is not the best drama ever on television. While grasping for realism, it too often morphs into the "how are we going to avert nuclear war" story of the week. But, then again, I watched "24" religiously for its entire run and that rarely made sense either. Still, "Madam Secretary" gives you a strongly-produced and well-acted hour each week and, unlike all those CSI shows, each episode does not open with a corpse on a slab down at the morgue.
Tea Leoni plays the title role of Secretary of State Elizabeth McCord and her raspy voice alone is worth the process of tuning in. When the series opens, she's not in the job, but toiling in the law profession and happily married to Georgetown professor Tim Daly and the mother of three kids. But, the Secretary of State is mysteriously killed in a car accident and the US President, in this case, Keith Carradine, offers her the gig. Naturally, she's an outsider and is soon butting heads with everybody.
So, we watch as she and her staff negotiate with foreign countries and terrorists and the Ambassador of Canada, who is played by Robert Klein! In between, she goes home to discuss it all with her husband and kids. Sometimes she goes to hubby's campus and they ponder the fate of the nature while walking around the grounds. In this case, Fordham University doubles as Georgetown and, while I never considered the issues of the world on Edwards Parade, I did spend many an idle moment wondering how to get a date for the next mixer.
If all this sounds rather pedestrian as an hour-long drama, the acting and the production values elevate it all. And, slowly, a continuing soap-like thread is being introduced. Elizabeth starts to believe that the previous Secretary's death might not have been accidental. She starts to suspect people in the White House as traitors and conspirators. Okay, now we're getting realistic. And, in true "24" mode, there is now an inkling of a mole on her staff.
So, I'm sold. And, when you watch this Madam Secretary at work, you begin to wish she really had the job. Just like I also secretly wished that William Devane from "24" could really be our President.
Sadly, the country is in much better shape on CBS every Sunday at 8PM than it is in real life.
Dinner last night: Chinese Chicken Salad.
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