After Kad & Olivier sign off and the Satisfaction production logo fades, viewing audiences are oftentimes treated to a cold open of an empty talk show set... one that quickly becomes the impromptu dance floor for a shameless Frenchman making an absolute giddy fool of himself while lip-syncing pop songs alongside a menagerie of...
wait, *what*?! That's right.
The Late Late Show's Craig Ferguson appears to have
a not-so-secret French admirer -- one who's not above ripping off both his opening titles and
his signature dance sequences (including
the iconic animal puppets):
"ABC" by The Jackson 5,
"Flashdance" by Irene Cara,
"On the Floor" by Jennifer Lopez and Pitbull,
"Waka Waka" by Shakira,
"Men in Black" by Will Smith,
"Let's All Chant" by the Michael Zager Band,
"Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" by Wham!,
"It's Raining Men" by The Weather Girls, and
"Vive Le Vent (Jingle Bells)" by Tino Rossi.
Luckily, Ferguson's sense of showmanship is
more prodigious than litigious -- he responded to Arthur's "
homáge" by booking a pair of translatlantic crossover shows, with Arthur visiting LA that week and Ferguson flying out to Paris just last month. Video of both shows (plus lots more) inside!
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jul 11, 2011 -
12 comments
When "The Dark, Dark Hours" episode of General Electric Theater aired live from Hollywood on December 12, 1954, Ronald Reagan and James Dean were just two actors yet to find the roles that would define them. –
The Atlantic has a six-minute video clip and some background.
posted by The Mouthchew
on Apr 27, 2010 -
6 comments
Fox News is the most trusted news network in the United States, according to a
new poll [.pdf] of 1,151 Americans conducted by
Public Policy Polling (a polling firm with a mostly Democratic and progressive
list of clients), the most trusted news network among Americans is FOX News, which was trusted by 49% of respondents (beating out CNN, MS-NBC, CBS, NBC, and ABC (though PBS was not included in the survey)).
The pollsters conclude:
“A generation ago you would have expected Americans to place their trust in the most
neutral and unbiased conveyors of news,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy
Polling. “But the media landscape has really changed and now they’re turning more
toward the outlets that tell them what they want to hear.”
posted by washburn
on Jan 26, 2010 -
126 comments
The WGA strike has entered its third month. Since New Year's,
Worldwide Pants, the
Weinstein Co., and
United Artists have reached interim deals with the WGA, with rumors of more to come.
Microsoft announced new deals with Hollywood companies. And on Friday,
ABC Studios terminated deals with more than a dozen writers. Tonight,
CBS,
NBC, and
20th Century Fox have followed suit. Names of producers, writers, and shows affected are still being revealed as letters are received.
Force majeure.
[more inside]
posted by Tehanu
on Jan 14, 2008 -
169 comments
Milo Radulovich, RIP --thrown out of the Air Force during the Red Scares, he fought back--Radulovich's case (and the new medium of TV) showed millions the impact McCarthy was having and the absurd lengths he was going to. He himself wasn't ever accused of being a Communist himself tho:
[more inside]
posted by amberglow
on Nov 21, 2007 -
32 comments
Social networking/music discovery site
Last.FM has been
sold to CBS for $280 million. Much as love the service, I can't help thinking that this feels like 2000 all over again...
posted by Cobbler
on May 30, 2007 -
73 comments
Road Closed for Tribal Council: Vunivutu Villagers Latest Beneficiaries of the Survivor Boomtown Effect
The hit "reality" TV show,
Survivor, premieres tonight on CBS
in the United States. Over the past year, a sleepy village on Vanua
Levu, the second largest island of Fiji has been hosting the
production crew—and reaping the benefits. 150 villagers have been employed by the crew to work about 10 hours a day, seven days a week, for USD 5.00 per hour (and double time on Sundays and holidays). For some it was their first experience in any form of paid employment. This
article from the Fiji Post, reposted by a Vanua Levu blogger, gives
some behind the scene details. Meanwhile the island's new eco-resort village is putting finishing touches on their community hall. Globe-trotting gap year students and reality TV junkies, look north. Vanua Levu is for lovers. [
Survivor Maps,
Vorovoro, the eco-resort with a difference,
Vorovoro's new bure (community hall),
Google's hires satellite image of the area]
posted by rschram
on Feb 8, 2007 -
3 comments
San Francisco, 1967. CBS news is there: "This is the house of a popular local band that plays hard rock music. They call themselves the
Grateful Dead." In between some
seriously heavy-handed editorializing from grand old man of the news Harry Reasoner, you can catch an interview with Garcia and company plus footage of a Golden Gate Park concert. Jump ahead 38 years, and another CBS newsman, a rather more respectful Ed Bradley, pays a friendly visit to grand old man of the 60's,
Mr. Zimmerman.
[links to Google video]
posted by flapjax at midnite
on Jan 10, 2007 -
97 comments
Let's Go To the Mall!! Could
Robin Sparkles be the patron saint of
Black Friday?
Ok, so maybe her myspace page is just marketing for a CBS sitcom, but her video is one of the funniest, most accurate (and too damned catchy for its own good!) 80's video parodies in recent memory.
The show's not bad, either. Probably the best comedy not on NBC right now.
posted by ericbop
on Nov 22, 2006 -
41 comments
Survivor: Cook Islands' 20 castaways will be grouped by race, with competitors divided into four tribes consisting of whites, blacks, Asians and Hispanics. If your reaction is "oof," you are
not alone.
But host Jeff Probst says, "I found it to be one of the freshest ideas we’ve had going back to the beginning of this show."
posted by amro
on Aug 23, 2006 -
102 comments
Dan Rather: : "If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story. Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.'" (reg. req.)
Andrew Sullivan: "Memo to Rather: you can't break that story, because someone else in pajamas already did. Check the frequency, Kenneth. You are so far from being out front on this, you are leagues behind in the dust. Have you heard of the Internet? You can find it on that weird machine in your office they call a computer."
Me: Is anyone else astonished as I am at how far CBS seems to have its head up its ass WRT news media in the 21st century?
posted by ericost
on Sep 16, 2004 -
128 comments
The BBC Motion Gallery provides access to film and video clips from the BBC and CBS. Registration required to view the clips, and only small, watermarked versions can be downloaded for free, but an interesting resource all the same.
posted by thatwhichfalls
on Jun 27, 2004 -
0 comments
CBS may cancel 'The Reagans' mini-series over GOP protests. Rep. John Dingall has some thoughts on the matter: As someone who served with President Reagan, and in the interest of historical accuracy, please allow me to share with you some of my recollections of the Reagan years that I hope will make it into the final cut of the mini-series: $640 Pentagon toilets seats; ketchup as a vegetable; union busting; firing striking air traffic controllers; Iran-Contra; selling arms to terrorist nations; trading arms for hostages; retreating from terrorists in Beirut; lying to Congress; financing an illegal war in Nicaragua; visiting Bitburg cemetery; a cozy relationship with Saddam Hussein; shredding documents; Ed Meese; Fawn Hall; Oliver North; James Watt; apartheid apologia; the savings and loan scandal; voodoo economics; record budget deficits; double digit unemployment; farm bankruptcies; trade deficits; astrologers in the White House; Star Wars; and influence peddling.
posted by skallas
on Nov 4, 2003 -
102 comments
The CBS News American Idol Power Hour. Viacom, owner of networks CBS and MTV among many others, is aggresively pushing lucrative
bribes offers for Private Jessica Lynch to get her on CBS News, including the possibility of her own video-hosting program on MTV and special editions of TRL. Corporate consolidation the way it is, are we in an era where synergy allows news-media-owning companies to offer not just material profit but flat-out media iconization in exchange for a good story? To put it another way: have we gone beyond using the news to promote entertainment owned by the same company to using entertainment as the currency to flat-out buy the news?
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Jun 16, 2003 -
12 comments
Plans For Iraq Attack Began On 9/11 "CBS News has learned that barely five hours after American Airlines Flight 77 plowed into the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld was telling his aides to come up with plans for striking Iraq — even though there was no evidence linking Saddam Hussein to the attacks." Rumsfeld: "Go massive ... Sweep it all up. Things related and not."
posted by owillis
on Sep 5, 2002 -
61 comments
