Posts Tagged ‘TV series’

The women of Grey Gardens


2009
06.14

The life stories of Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter Little Edie were featured in the latest HBO series, Grey Gardens. Both were from prominent families, occasionally gracing the social circles of New York’s elite. However, circumstances dramatically reduced them from intelligent and fashionable ladies to mentally-deranged women who resigned their lives to fate and were constantly haunted by their failed aspirations. Their story first went to public in a documentary in 1976. It was also during this time that their relative, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, rescued them, and their East Hampton mansion-turned-garbage pit from deteriorating further.

Jessica Lange and Drew Barrymore breathed life into these two eccentric personalities. I must say that the acting was exceptionally brilliant. It was as if you’re watching the real Edith and Edie act on screen. You could hardly distinguish them it becomes somewhat creepy. Not to mention the haunting view of the controversial and smelly Grey Gardens Mansion getting into the nostrils and nerves of the residents in the posh New York suburb, and this time, the viewers, too.

Sneak peek:

By the way, it has been more than two years since this website’s first birthday. Major changes coming soon.

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Wentworth Miller: Fish Anyone?


2007
07.25

Wentworth Miller is Michael Scofield, the genius behind the notorious escape from Fox River Penitentiary. And there is no way you can ignore this guy – his powerful performance in Fox TV series Prison Break makes him one of the world’s most sought-after guy to date.

wentworth miller

Here’s Prison Break’s all favorite fish on silver platter:

The strikingly handsome and refined British actor Wentworth Miller gained his greatest notoriety as Michael Scofield on the Fox network’s serial drama Prison Break. Born June 2, 1972, in Chipping Norton, England, as the son of a Rhodes Scholar, Miller moved to Brooklyn with his parents as a boy; his family relocated to Pennsylvania’s Quaker country during Miller’s adolescence. After high school, Miller attended Princeton University and studied English, but — despite a love of acting that he had harbored since boyhood — he reportedly gravitated away from drama in the pro-business atmosphere of the university. Following graduation, Miller moved to Los Angeles and held down jobs as an assistant at a film production company and a bookstore clerk while he gradually realized his own desire to act and started attending auditions. He debuted before the cameras in a one-episode role, as Gage Petronzi on the hit syndicated series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and landed another one-time stint as Mike Palmieri on ER. But he was poised to break through to more prominent roles with his turn in the 2003 Robert Benton-directed, Nicholas Meyer-scripted drama The Human Stain. That picture casts Anthony Hopkins as Coleman Silk, a Negro who has spent all his life passing as a Jew; Miller plays the young Silk, and delivers some of the most effective scenes in the film. (One memorable bit has him climbing into the boxing ring and beating a black opponent senseless, out of self hatred). Unfortunately, despite outstanding craftsmanship and winning performances all around, the public mysteriously rejected The Human Stain, and thus inadvertently held Miller back from A-list stardom. (The critics were particularly vicious about Miller’s inclusion in the film — The New York Times’ A.O. Scott unfairly complained that Miller looked nothing like Hopkins, and cynically remarked that his juxtaposition alongside coal-black parents reminded one of Steve Martin in The Jerk).

Miller’s determination doubled, however, and he became notoriously selective, even turning down less esteemed roles to hold out for more respected films and parts. The gamble paid off: after a solid turn as Dr. Adam Lockwood in the sci-fi action thriller Underworld (2003) and a best-forgotten contribution to the embarrassing action thriller Stealth (2005) — as the voice of the computer EDI — the thesp landed second billing on Prison Break. His Michael Scofield is a structural engineer whose brother Lincoln sits on death row in a local penitentiary, for a crime he did not commit. Armed with a full blueprint of the prison and an outrageously complex escape plan, Michael commits a crime to have himself incarcerated and assist his brother with a breakout. The program premiered in late 2005 to solid ratings; Variety observed of the program: “Thus far, easily the most compelling element is Miller, who with his steely intensity conveys a guy capable of outwitting, outlasting, and outplaying whatever the prison and its gruff warden (Stacy Keach, billed as a guest star) can throw at him.”

Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Miller’s sterling performance in Prison Break earned him a nomination as Best Actor in 2005 Golden Globe Awards. At one time, he also auditioned for the role of Clark Kent/Superman in Superman Returns.

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Prison Break


2007
07.24

Maybe it’s my lack of patience to follow weekly TV series that made the idea of watching any of those unappealling to me. But watching Heroes by accident piqued my interest – there are TV dramas out there worth my weekly devotion.

Such as crime-drama-supense Prison Break.

Prison Break airs on Crime-Suspense cable channel. It first aired in 2005 on Fox TV. The story is about two brothers’ sensational escape from Fox River Penitentiary.

Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell) was convicted to die by electrocution for a crime he did not commit – murdering the brother of the US Vice President. His brother, Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller), a structural engineer, devised a plan to incarcerate himself into prison to free his brother by committing armed robbery. Scofield, who incidentally helped design Fox River Penitentiary, tattooed the elaborate plan on his body.

Surprisingly, a motley crew of convicts, there were 6 of them, joined Scofield in the escape plan. And they all succeeded breaking out the walls of Fox River, giving them an overnight notoriety as America’s most wanted criminals.

Prison Break is a huge conspiracy story spunned by the vice president herself to keep her skeletons from the public eye, leaving behind her a bloody trail Burrows and Scofield are about to uncover.

Cast:

Dominic Purcell (Lincoln Burrows)
Wentworth Miller (Michael Scofield)
Robin Tunney (Veronica Donovan)
Sarah Wayne Callies (Dr. Sara Tancredi)
Amaury Nolasco (Fernando Sucre)
Wade Williams (Officer Brian Bellick)
Marshall Allman (LJ)
Paul Adelstein (Agent Paul Kellerman)
Robert Knepper (T-Bag)
Sarah Wayne Callies (Dr. Tancredi)
Peter Stormare (John Abruzzi)
Stacy Keach – (Warden Pope)
Muse Watson – (Charles Westmoreland)
Lane Garrison – (Tweener)

More here.

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