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MY HEART IS A-QUIVER
Tuesdays on the telly
I had intended to write this, my virgin weekly column, on Zhores I. Alferov, Herbert Kroemer, and Jack Kilby, who earlier today captured the coveted Nobel Prize in physics. But I figure most people aren't as obsessed with the Prizes as I am (Can you believe Gerardus Hooft and Martinus Veltman didn't repeat?). Instead, I shall write about a luminary of far greater interest to my readership -- all seven of you.
I refer, of course, to Geena Davis.
Davis is the star of the cleverly titled "The Geena Davis Show," which premieres tonight at 9:30 on ABC. What is significant here is not that TV executives have picked from Hollywood's trash yet another fading actor and given her an eponymous sitcom. TV executives are as cutting-edge as a drawerful of sporks, and this particular crew used up their allotment of innovative ideas for the next decade when they green-lighted Regis. What is significant here is that I am aware of the show at all.
Let me explain. Unless the program involves a ball being dribbled on parquet, spiked on astroturf, or hurled at great speeds by double-jointed Cuban defectors, I don't watch much television. So I should be as blissfully ignorant of ABC's New Fall Lineup as I was of the Olympics.
But I somehow know that Geena Davis has her own show. For weeks, Davis's toothy, buttoncute smile has been plastered throughout the city. Promos have run during sporting events. I even saw one in the movie theatre, before the film previews (Close shot of Geena musing whether the show's title was "too braggy"). Either the marketers totally missed their target audience, or I was a victim of the greatest advertising campaign since Tae-Bo.
A huge media conglomorate wouldn't spend millions of dollars promoting just anything, surely? Maybe there's more to this show than meets the eye.
By far the most interesting thing about Geena Davis is that she is a fairly proficient archer; she went so far as to enter the Olympic trials in that sport. Perhaps the format of "The Geena Davis Show" is to bind an annoying quasi-celebrity -- Peter Horton, the show's co-star, would do nicely -- to a tree, place an apple on his head, and have Geena do the William Tell thing. If she hits the apple, a housewife from Dubuque wins a million dollars. If she misses, the quasi-celebrity suffers a grisly death. Either way, the audience wins! It would be like "Celebrity Death Match," only with bows and arrows, and real. I'd tune in for half an hour to watch that, especially if they could sign up, say, Jake Lloyd.
But no. The show is a sitcom, which is to television what the bowl of fruit is to oil painting. And its premise (single woman suddenly finds herself the married stepmother of two adorably cute kids) does not sound like it would be funny in the Land Beyond the Laugh Track.
The draw, then, must be the show's star. Wherefore Geena Davis?
Certainly she has tasted of success. She won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her work in 1988's The Accidental Tourist and may have won for Thelma & Louise three years later had she and co-star Susan Sarandon not split votes.
But she evidently broke a mirror during the filming of 1993's A League of Their Own, because she's endured seven years of bad luck. Her next film, Hero, with Dustin Hoffman, was a commercial and critical flop. Then she married the Finnish director Renny Harlin, which effectively finished (ba-dum-dum) her film career. Given full creative control and a big budget, the newlyweds produced one of the worst box office busts of all time, the dreadful Cutthroat Island. They followed this with 1996's The Long Kiss Goodnight, which was merely dreadful. Last time I checked, Davis was hosting the red-carpet pre-show at the Academy Awards, which is a bit like Leon Wood's taking a job as a ref after being cut by his last NBA team.
This is the big star around which ABC has built its show? Heck, Davis has already had her own sitcom ("Sara") and it only ran for one season (1985). What is the network thinking?
We might also inquire what Davis is thinking. Having made the quantum leap from boob tube to silver screen, why would she want to go back? Hollywood has its own caste system: A-list movie star, B-list movie star, character actor, and so forth. TV star, as I understand it, falls somewhere between body double and key grip. If you don't believe me, ask Ted Danson.
ABC better have another quiz show up its sleeve, because "The Geena Davis Show" smells like another Cutthroat Island to me. I've been wrong before, true; I laughed at, and not with, Forrest Gump. But this time next year, don't be surprised to find Geena occupying the square next to Whoopi's.
(I agree, and I'll take Shadow Stevens to block).
By Greg Olear
101000