Friday nights are perfect for doing a weekly TiVo cleanse, especially if the sudden glut of new television shows worth watching has clogged your DVR. If you've gone and created a scheduling nightmare because you refuse to choose between a McDreamy/McSteamy showdown or hot science geeks fight crime or hot brothers battling the supernatural, here are a few tips from a tried-and-true TVaholic:
> Get a new TiVo! They're practically free with rebate and service agreement. Put one in each room and it's easy to transfer programs between the two with a USB antenna and the same router you use for wifi. Some of the new models even allow you to record one basic and one digital channel at the same time, and many of the cable company brand DVRs come pre-equipped to do double duty.
> Pay & play. There's always iTunes, where for two bucks a pop you can watch episodes of CSI:, Law & Order: SVU, Studio 60, Heroes, Grey's Anatomy and more. The files are fairly high quality, take somewhere between five minutes and an hour to download depending on your connection, and can be saved as long as you want. (Warning: I hear that iTunes 7, required for video downloads, still has some kinks to work out. And not in the fun way.)
> Watch online for free. This is the first year that every big network has made more than a token effort to put ad-supported streaming video of its biggest hits on their websites and (in some cases) that of their affiliates. TVWeek's Daisy Whitney has been gamely trying each of the sites and reporting on which succeed and fail. (Apple fiends: these things almost always work better in Firefox than they do in Safari.) Bottom line, if there's a new show whose premiere you missed, or an old favorite you want to catch up on, check out the network site and chances are you can find what you want.
And if all that's not gay enough for you, both Logo and here! have put at least some of their short film collections and assorted other goodies online. Here's hoping they catch up with the big kids and remember that queers are used to looking for tasty treats online.
[Update: I lamely forgot that OutzoneTV has great streaming gay content, too. And EW's Popwatch has volunteered to help untangle your TV Traffic Jam each week. Check them both out.]
Behind the jump, pictures aplenty from Pink's first night touring Europe, with pit stops at your local leather bar, a Sapphic Cirque du Soleil performance and a school for troubled young punk lesbians.
There's also an unexpected guest star who steals the scene: his girlfriend and the mother of his child, Melanie:
She appears, looking as motherly as one can with a two-tone mohawk. Like Sebelia, whose tattooed neck spells out Harrison Detroit and the phrase L'amore Della Mia Vita (the love of my life), Melanie recently had their son's name etched below her collarbone.
The housewife role has admittedly not come easy for someone with so much ambition of her own. Melanie attended Juilliard and arrived in Los Angeles as a working actress and stand-up comedian. She was also a lesbian who had been accidentally shot by her cop ex-girlfriend. "I hadn't been in a relationship with a man for eight or nine years," she says, laughing. "I went from driving a Trans Am, dressing like a hooker, being a club DJ and doing stand-up comedy to being this kind of housewife character. I've come to a place of peace about my role now, but not without a few panic attacks."
She says this situation is, in large part, a result of Sebelia's appearance on "Project Runway." ... "He was gone for 5 1/2 weeks and we talked on the phone three times, two of which were on camera so they were totally fake. 'Hi honey, I'm so proud of you.' Meanwhile, I'm thinking, 'Get your ass home. Do we even have any money?'"
Whether he cheatedor not is still up in the air, as is any further narrowing of the field. Whether Jeffrey even deserves the warm welcome Melanie may or may not show him is similarly undecided.
Bikinis. The only thing that could possibly make fake-teenage lesbians hotter. Photo: Courtesy The N.
The not-quite-teens from teen drama South of Nowhere want to make it clear that no matter how lame-brained their characters may be in responding to cornfed Spencer's questioning queerness, they're all for being cool with the coming out.
It's a welcome slice o' sexy to hold us over until the weekend when, according to a release from the show, "Spencer (Gabrielle Christian) accepts her sexuality, falls in love for the first time and seeks acceptance, understanding and reconciliation from her family, while her mother Paula does everything in her power to divert Spencer's infatuation with Ashley including bringing her best friend Debbie to Los Angeles from Ohio."
If you ever watched My So-Called Life, or Popular, or Dawson's Creek, or really any other high school drama ever made up to and including Saved By the Bell, and you just wished in your heart of hearts as you watched the girls who were obviously so obsessed with each other and their hysterics-laded friendship breakups and their slumber parties -- go watch South of Nowhere, because it takes it to the next, completely obvious level of curious exploration. It's compassionate without being lamely P.C., and sweetly sexy without being, well, too sketchy.
You can get last season on iTunes (or, hell, probably on YouTube, also) and once you start you'll be completely addicted. And you can read more from bad girl Ashley (Mandy Musgrave) over at AfterEllen.com, who thankfully knows exactly what the best part of her job is: "The easy part is making out with Gabby, 'cause she's hot. That's totally easy."
Murphy, who has begun writing a pilot episode he hopes to shoot early next year, told Daily Variety
that he has mapped out a natural five-season arc for the series that
also focuses on the gender-conflicted protag's teenage sons. ...
"The first season deals with the
revelation of his secret," Murphy said. "In the second season, he
begins dressing like a woman. The third covers the surgery, and his
inherent doubts about going through with it, and by the fourth season,
he's living as a woman and attempting to find love."
The show's called "4 oz.," which Murphy has carefully and scientifically calculated as the average weight of a penis, "remarkably light given the amount of havoc it creates for men."
In the name of art and science and accurate criticism, I now fully expect all you size queens to go get out that food scale and try this at home. Please promptly report back with your results.
There is just no good gay news today, so at the risk of breaking the best-known mix-tape rule (don't put two songs by the same artist on one mix!) or its blogger remix (don't post only about Lance Bass all damn day!), here's a picture I snapped during an afternoon stroll in West Hollywood.
Somehow I don't think it was the highlight of Anderson's evening, though, as his show was busy winning its first (and second) news Emmys, for breaking coverage of the famine in Niger and a report from Dr. Sanjay Gupta about New Orleans' Charity Hospital that first aired during 360.
TVNewser points out that Anderson's snagged a golden statuette before -- for "his contribution to ABC's coverage of Princess Diana's funeral." Are we sure that wasn't a special GLAAD award?
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