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10 reasons why you shouldn’t blow off the Emmy Awards this year
LORI RACKL: It’s worth watching to hear Jimmy Kimmel’s jokes, to look at the fashions and to find out if “Mad Men” breaks a record.
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‘Revolution’ turns lights out on Chicago, has flashes of fun
LORI RACKL: NBC’s new sci-fi fantasy “Revolution” is about a world where the lights have gone out for good. Creator Eric Kripke promises to answer the show’s many questions shortly after they arise so that the audience is never in the dark for too long.
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DePaul grad gets to be droll in dystopia
Dramas like “Revolution” need a little comic relief, and that’s where Libertyville native Zak Orth comes in. Orth plays Aaron, a guy who made a lot of money in a field suddenly rendered obsolete. “I used to work at a place called Google,” Aaron says …Read More
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Chicago mobsters loom larger in new ‘Boardwalk Empire’ season
LORI RACKL: Al Capone and the city’s other notorious sons play a big role in HBO’s Prohibition-era drama, which kicks off season three Sunday with one of its best episodes yet.
5 exciting TV premieres this week, from ‘The Mob Doctor’ to ‘Parks and Recreation’
As the fall TV season heats up, here are my five favorite premieres this week: MONDAY “The Mob Doctor”: 8 p.m. on WFLD-Channel 32 A surgeon (Jordana Spiro) moonlights for the mob to protect her family. Spiro’s character has the potential to develop into an …
As ‘The Voice,’ ‘X Factor’ do battle, one’s armed with Britney Spears
LORI RACKL: For the first time, the two singing competitions will share a fall season. Which one will emerge the winner?
3 new ‘SNL’ cast members have Chicago roots
Three Chicago comics have been added to “Saturday Night Live’s” cast.
Key ‘Oprah’ staffers bring their expertise to new daytime shows
LORI RACKL: Oprah Winfrey vacated the daytime talk-show throne last year, but many of the people who helped put her there have landed on the payroll of a new crop of shows vying to fill the chatfest vacuum. “Katie,” “The Ricki Lake Show” and “The Jeff Probst Show” debut Monday.
Kenneth Branagh’s Wallander leads brooding Scandinavian sleuths
LORI RACKL: “Wallander,” one of the first TV crime dramas in the increasingly popular Nordic noir genre, starts its third season Sunday on PBS. Scandinavian dramas are in high demand, with several U.S. adaptations of across-the-pond hits in the works.
7 premieres worth catching this week on TV
LORI RACKL: Jimmy Smits joins “Sons of Anarchy,” Britney Spears starts judging “The X Factor” and Kate Hudson fires up “Glee.”
Jokes dumb, advice humdrum on first ‘Steve Harvey’ talk show
LORI RACKL: Comedian Steve Harvey’s new daytime talker could occasionally be described as fun, but it’s a stretch to call it funny. And doling out ordinary advice to ordinary people isn’t going to cut it in the increasingly competitive world of daytime chatfests.
Steve Harvey promises to ‘think like a man’ on chatfest
LORI RACKL: Steve Harvey, whose new made-in-Chicago talk show bows Tuesday on WMAQ-Channel 5, promises: “My frankness and openness are going to be refreshing. And it’s a male perspective. That’s missing in daytime television, having a man share with women some of the thoughts from a man’s angle.”
‘Chicago Trauma’ looks at aftermath of the city’s crime wave
LORI RACKL: Set in the Cook County trauma unit at Stroger Hospital, the hourlong “Chicago Trauma” on National Geographic Channel gives viewers a close-up look at the life-or-death dramas that play out an almost hourly basis in one of the nation’s busiest trauma centers.
Fall TV preview: Female doctors lead promising new shows
LORI RACKL: The season is full of medicine women, who star in four of the broadcast networks’ freshman series: Fox’s “The Mindy Project” and “The Mob Doctor,” the CW’s “Emily Owens, M.D.” and CBS’ “Elementary,” which shakes up the Sherlock Holmes story by making Watson a woman.
The best and the worst of the new fall season
Less than half of last fall’s new TV shows survived broadcast networks’ ever-escalating war for eyeballs; NBC’s poor “Playboy Club” was the first casualty after a mere three episodes. Of course, not all good shows stick around (“Prime Suspect”), and not all bad ones get …Read More
Jimmy Kimmel will battle David Letterman, Jay Leno head-on
LORI RACKL: After nearly a decade of hosting his eponymous talk show, Jimmy Kimmel will move to the 10:35 p.m. sweet spot on Jan. 8, when he’ll go mano-a-mano with the big boys. His show is growing in popularity, and for the host, “it feels good.”
Step right up to Fox’s ‘Ben and Kate’ to see the greatest bro on Earth
LORI RACKL: “Ben and Kate” is about a sister teaching her brother to grow up and a brother teaching his sister to loosen up. A natural fit for Fox’s new four-sitcom block on Tuesday nights, the series debuts Sept. 25. But there are plenty of ways to catch it before then.
Cohen Brothers of Chicago’s Royal Pawn set to star in reality series
The pawn industry is ripe fodder for reality television, and “Hardcore Pawn: Chicago” is a new spinoff headed for truTV later this year. It’s set at a pawn shop owned by Randy and Wayne Cohen, brothers of former Democratic lieutenant governor candidate Scott Lee Cohen.
Like Kelsey Grammer’s mayor, ratings for stellar ‘Boss’ far from healthy
LORI RACKL: Kelsey Grammer is back as ruthless Mayor Tom Kane in the second season of the Starz drama “Boss,” an intoxicating blend of soap opera sudsiness, Shakespearean tragedy and scathing insight into big city politics, Chicago-style.
Martin Sheen joins Charlie Sheen on FX comedy “Anger Management”
LORI RACKL: Charlie Sheen says his dad “brings a whole different energy” to the sitcom, which looks likely to get picked up by the cable net for another 90 episodes.
