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GREIL MONACO�S NO-LIFE TOP 10 (okay, Top 6)-- The All-TV Edition

Filed under: Imported

1) Conservative night on Real Time with Bill Maher. To his credit, Maher is the only former Nader supporter who�s acknowledged that his sell-out (his words) for Kerry was a mistake, and since he�s been on HBO, he�s been funnier and sharper than he ever was on ABC. So far, though, the new season has been boring at best and infuriating at worst, and the recent show where the audience was deliberately constructed to be 50% conservatives was both. (How and why they did it was never explained.) The panel featured two Republican nerd-women, including Christie Todd Whitman, and even though Maher�s topics were politically safe and his language was almost G-rated (tailored to his audience and a hypocritical move for a comic who prides himself on being politically incorrect), you could tell that he still went too far for these stiffs in every way. Then again, maybe Bill was just practicing for when the FCC neuters cable TV, too.

2) Monk�The First Season. I�ve been watching the DVDs, with one disc lasting me sometimes two months, and I�ve finally figured out why I like it: other than the innovative idea of a phobia-ridden detective with OCD, the episodes are like B-movies from the �40s. They go by easily, the same way certain formula crime fiction from the past does (87th Precinct, Travis McGee), and there�s always something original and funny about the main character that makes them worth the watch. And Tony Shaloub�s performance will someday earn him a TVLand Lifetime Achievement Award.

3) During the commercial, I invent a new sandwich. Salami, ham, bacon, pastrami and melted cheese. I named it after my favorite Charles Bronson movie: The Death-wich.

4) Joey Greco, host of Cheaters, my new favorite show. Described by one disgruntled cheater as �a metrosexual with glasses,� I can�t think of anyone else currently doing television who puts himself out there for insult and, occasionally, injury like Joey. Finally, a reality show that not only deals with the heartache of a romantic breakup but actually causes it. During the confrontation scenes, where the cheater under investigation is busted on-camera, Joey has narrowly avoided several beatings and still kept his sepulchral cool. In perhaps the best episode of them all, where he takes a woman to see her boyfriend getting flogged in a motel room, the dominatrix tells Joey, �You have a really annoying face.� TV is going to have to do some serious sit-ups to be able to bend much lower than this�Joey, hats off.

5) James on the new Survivor. Head the size of a marble, brain the size of a pea, nose almost as big as his ego. He was born to star in the movie version of Roy Tompkins� comic, Harvey the Hillbilly Bastard. I hope he wins.

6) Daniel Baldwin, reality-TV joke. On one of the celebrity card-game shows (a craze that can die right now), Baldwin was sniffing his head off, acting crazy and actually got up on-camera to �use the bathroom.� Next, he�s on VH1�s Celebrity Fit Club, an exercise in humilation for obese show-biz types whose career is at the level of doing a reality weight-loss show. He winds up so strung out that he doesn�t show for the final weigh-in, and admits on-camera to getting Percocet �scrips from multiple doctors. I predict Baldwin�s next appearance will be on the new reality show�no joke�Intervention.

Posted by Steve Monaco at March 23, 2005 5:16 AM

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