I had mixed feelings about The Newsroom, which premieres this Sunday night on HBO. It’s on HBO, so I feel like I have to give it a shot, but I also invested far too much of my life into Aaron Sorkin’s last look into the world of television, the sanctimonious and not at all funny Studio 60, which is more notable these days for being the show people thought would be more successful than 30 Rock. However, the guy can do great work including The Social Network, Moneyball and how I remember Sports Night to be, so it seems like there’s some promise.
While The New Yorker‘s Emily Nussbaum uses her review of the first episode as a referendum of sorts on Sorkin’s work as a whole, her brutal takedown sort of makes me think I should skip the show altogether:
“The Newsroom” sounded more promising, journalism being a natural habitat for blowhards. But so far the series lacks the squirmy vigor of “Studio 60,” particularly since Sorkin saps the drama with an odd structural choice. Rather than invent fictional crises, he’s set the show in “the recent past,” so that the plot is literally old news: the BP oil spill, the Tea Party, the Arizona immigration law. That sounds like an innovative concept, but it turns the characters into back-seat drivers, telling us how the news should have been delivered. (Instead of “Broadcast News,” it’s like a sanctimonious “Zelig.”) Naturally, McAvoy slices through crises by “speaking truth to stupid,” in McHale’s words. But he also seizes credit for “breaking stories”—like the political shenanigans of the Koch brothers—that were broken by actual journalists, all of them working in print or online. In the fourth episode, the show injects a real-life tragedy into the mix, pouring a pop ballad over the montage, just the way “E.R.” used to do whenever a busload of massacred toddlers came crashing through the door.
This article appears in Jun 14-20, 2012.
I loved “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” (it’s one of my all-time favorite shows), but I’m a little nervous after seeing some previews of “The Newsroom”, which has me thinking that, unlike the tired barbs lobbed at Sorkin’s previous series, this new show looks like it might be a bit sanctimonious. But being the rabid Sorkin fan that I am, I’ll be tuning in for the entire run.
As for “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”, why didn’t it catch on? I can think of four reasons.
One, the show was too literate. With references to Strindberg, Moliere, Chayefvsky, and the like, it alienated many viewers who are not — *cough* — educated. “Patty who?”
Two, the show-within-the-show wasn’t as funny as it ought to have been (though Sarah Paulson’s Juliette Lewis was great as was “The Nicholas Cage Show”). Sorkin’s error here was not that he can’t be funny (he can: “The Disaster Show” episode was particularly funny), it’s just that his humor here could be too dry for its own good.
Three, Matt Albie was an atheist, who never missed a chance to mock religion (I’m also an atheist and I take every chance I can get) — and you can’t make fun of religion, at least not on network TV.
Finally, I can see the argument that perhaps the stakes weren’t compelling enough. With a cop show or a lawyer show, the stakes tend to be high: who will get the killer? who is guilty? But with “Studio 60” the stakes were largely concerned with the issues of putting on a TV show, and while I loved this premise and had no problem with the stakes as presented, to many people the concerns of the characters just weren’t urgent enough.
So I loved the show. Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford had fantastic chemistry, and the episodes with guest stars were terrific. Christine Lahti had a fine recurring role as a reporter for “Vanity Fair”, John Goodman was great in a two-parter, and the Eli Wallach episode, which was about comedy writers who were blacklisted in the 1950s, was very moving. “Blacklisted in the 1950s? What does that mean?”, asked too many clueless (read: young) viewers, I’m sorry to say.
And so it’s on to “The Newsroom”!
The previous comment is exactly why many people (like myself) eschew the audience sought by Sorkin: an audience that flatters itself it is literate, but doesn’t even know that Chayefsky’s first name was “Paddy”, not “Patty.”
Bring that same smug naivete to matters of economics and politics and you have the Sorkin echo chamber in full.
Aaron Sorkin is a pretentious ass that thinks he can preach his way into the hearts of America. Guess what. We don’t want preachy liberal propaganda or heinous, unfunny, smarmy banter between the “educated” and “qualified.” Aaron Sorkin is a hack. Breaking Bad is a great show. Game of Thrones is a great show. The Killing is a great show. None of these have to do with politics. They focus on the humanity of their characters without spewing out references to Dostoevsky. Sorkin thinks it’s an inside joke to everybody that went to Harvard or Yale or Dartmouth for him to quote an obscure line from Kerouac. ENOUGH from him! Boycott Sorkin and David E. Kelly. They both think they are far more brilliant than they actually are. Are they smart? Probably. But for all we know they are Googling “Top 10 quotes by Jay McInerney” before they write a script. Don’t watch The Newsroom. Watch Veep instead! Far more funny and way better characters.
^^
Yeah, let’s not think about politics at all. Let the politicians do that! I just want to watch harry potter and lord of the rings! //sarcasm
Sorkin should have stayed on cocaine- everything he’s done since “getting clean” definitely sucks. The pitter-patter stupid dialog (people do NOT communicate that way in the real world Aaron) gives me a gigantic migraine headache. And watching Sam Waterston horribly over-act his drunken “Charlie” (the boss) is the last straw. “The Newsroom” is self-possessed and just plain boring. Boo HBO – NBC produces better dramas than this dog.
Well, above commenter, you are the first person I’ve heard that thinks Watson’s performance is not good. I think he’s one of the best actors on The Newsroom, but I also like the show as a whole, another thing we seem to disagree on. I don’t find anything wrong with an intelligently written show that gives the audience something to actually think about with the messages Sorkin delivers each week. His bold critique on our mainstream media organizations and the flaws that exist within make us reflect upon how our society is truly dictated, which is great food for thought and spurs a world of debate around the office at Dish the next day; to me, that is a sign of great TV! I have the enjoyed the series so far and already have it set to the top of my DVR priority list. Luckily, I have the Hopper DVR that comes with loads of recording space so, if The Newsroom does turn out to be the disappointment critics (and apparently you) are hoping for, at least I didn’t waste precious memory on it. I’m definitely impressed so far to say the least!
I’ve never watched an episode entirely through, but I do watch a lot of HBO, so I’ve tried to tolerate The Newsroom.
Every time I’ve seen it, it’s always Emily Mortimer screaming at that guy who’s supposed to be Chris Matthews. Every. F@$^ing. Time. Sometimes she’s yelling at Chris Matthews, and the dude from Law & Order is thrown in for good measure. Then three minutes of Dev Patel and his crew, and back to Emily Mortimer screaming at Chris Matthews.
HBO should cancel The Newsroom and use the money to add a few more episodes to each season of Game of Thrones. It’s the difference between a critically-panned bomb that gets 400,000 viewers, and a universally acclaimed show that draws 10 million viewers an episode, and another 15 million an episode via DVR, on-demand and HBO Go.
Even if they tack on another four episodes, that’s a month longer that most will subscribe.