Real TV Critics

This guy was an awesome writer.  An awesome performer.  He and his wife had a club in New York that I went to one night to see an old school R & B group The Main Ingredient. Cuba Gooding, Sr. was a member of that singing trio?  Or were there four of them?  Yeah it was three but a few or more past members.

The Main Ingredient.  But this story is about the great Nick Ashford.  Part of the incredible duo of Ashford and Simpson, which included his wife Valerie Simpson.  The music they made was just amazing.  Yes a blast from the past again.

Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson, "Ashford and Simpson"

When you watch the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams and you see a story about the passing of Nick Ashford you know you’re at the top of your musical game.  And you are when you get writing credits from Amy Winehouse…OK so maybe that’s not big with her demise.  But Motown greats like Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, Reach Out and Touch Somebody’s Hand and I’m Every Woman by Chaka Khan.  And then he and his wife Valerie’s Solid or the dance monster hit Found a Cure.

Nick Ashford, excuse my French, was the snap.  You know what I mean.  I remember back in my old mobile deejay days the instrumental we played at weddings when announcing the bride and groom along with the full wedding party.  Most don’t remember Bourgie Bourgie.

Nick Ashford passed away today at the age of 70 from throat cancer.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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You know we get earthquakes on a regular basis here in California.  But that’s standard.  An earthquake happens, we see the meter that shows us its strength, they interview those geeks at the earthquake headquarters at some college out here and we go on with our lives saying “whew” as we have cheated death again.

KC and the Sunshine Band "Shake Your Booty"

Today we have Virginia.  Washington, DC.  New York City and further points north with an earthquake they say was a 5.8 deal, one of the biggest in almost 70 years which shook the east coast to the core.  My brother was in a restaurant in Washington when it happened.  I have to laugh my rear off because he always said to me he would not move to any place in California because he was not in to earthquakes.

Welcome to the party pal.

The coverage even here in Los Angeles was at it best.  Since we have a lot of earthquakes here in Cali a lot of local TV stations and networks in Washington were getting a lesson in the end of the damn world from our local peeps.  Yeah people in New York crowded the streets, the highways, the buses and trains to go home in personal fear that we live here in Los Angeles every day.  Get this.  We’re so used to this in southern California that after a certain period of time living in this area you just get used to having the ground or your building shake for a short blip and you go on with your life.

But keep watching the local and network news.  It’s absolutely fascinating to chat with people back east.  Once again welcome to the party pal.

Rick Thomas

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Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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Oh this could be one of those break-ups for the legal record books.  Because the only people that are gonna win in this potential battle are going to be the lawyers.  Two major names in the TV and film business along with their two minor kids making some serious gap as well will lead to nothing more than a legal mess.

In Touch Weekly is reporting that TV and film power couple Will and Jada Pinkett Smith are about to call it quits.  And that’s their marriage which has been in place for the last 13 years.

Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith

And guess what?  It’s “completely false” according to a statement released by the couple after In Touch Weekly has proved to be totally out of touch.  “Although we are reluctant to respond to these types of press reports, the rumors circulating about our relationship are completely false.”

That from the at this point the clearly more reliable On The Red Carpet.

Well at least this rumor is false.  If not I would not want to be anywhere near singer/actor Marc Anthony who just finished up a set of shows on Jada’s TNT drama HawthoRNe.  He and his former flame Jennifer Lopez announced the end to their marriage recently and hopefully the bug hasn’t spread to Jada’s neighborhood.

Not to pick on In Touch Weekly but where there’s smoke there’s fire.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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Well it happened, finally after so much hype and sizzle that would make most think this was a royal wedding.  Well this was a royal wedding, wasn’t it?  For those of us in the blog world this is a big deal.  The wedding of television reality star Kim Kardashian and New Jersey Nets pro basketball player Kris Humphries.

The Saturday event was covered by CNN, CBS and many other news outlets were there.  E! had the exclusive rights to film video from the wedding which of course will be shown on the network and on their web-site.  And you can expect a ton of coverage on all of the entertainment news shows as well.

E!’s got the only content available and they will also be planning a four hour special on the wedding that will run sometime in September or October.  But I gotta tell you judging from the like and dislikes on the E! video you see below E! might think twice about some sort of special.  Seems most of us are done with any more follow-up on this and we’re getting close to who cares status on this story.

So get ready.  It’s a slow news week in the entertainment business because it’s August.  And the Kardashian media machine is up and running.  Everywhere you turn this week it will be “all Kardashian all the time” on television.  We’re gonna link you over to the Hollywood Reporter story about the media mayhem.

Enjoy.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/kim-kardashian-wedding-how-media-225750

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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Well I don’t know about you but I’m done seeing Dave Navarro in those CitiBank commercials that have been running like crazy all over television.  You know the one with ‘Sam’ who wanted to go to guitar or rock & roll camp with his CitiBank card points.  And his wife give it to him as a gift?  How can you miss this commercial, right?  Then at the end, Dave Navarro from Jane ‘s Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers comes on toward the end, does a guitar rant and tells ‘Sam’ to do the same thing.  Then Sam looks at the guitar like a deer in the headlights.

Dave Navarro from 'Jane's Addiction'

Well wait, there’s gonna be more with Dave Navarro and not a lot of ‘Sam’ thank goodness because I’m tired of that commercial.  The tattooed guitarist from Jane’s Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers is getting a Spike TV reality show called Inkmaster, an eight episode run that he will host.  And the goal is to become the best tattoo artist that a reality show can find.

I really think this is one of the more creative concepts for male oriented Spike TV ever.

Navarro will be looking for people who can give the best first tattoo, add on to existing tattoo or the best of removing tattoos.   There will also be a panel of judges that will also include Navarro.

Jane’s Addiction recently dropped a new single Irresistible Force from the CD The Great Escape Artist.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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There’s finally an ending.  A happing ending that will be re-worked for probably the final part of a three arc documentary for one of the most lesser known sagas of three men who were teenagers and arrested for the murders of three cub scouts.  The West Memphis Three was a horrific story about the case that apparently railroaded three accused of the crime.

Johnny Depp and Keith Richards

Damian Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jesse Misskelley were convicted of murdering three 8 year old cub scouts in the early 90′s and have been in prison since the but were released last week for time served after an ongoing effort to discredit the outcome of the original case.  With the support of HBO’s two previous documentaries and the likes of Johnny Depp, Pearl Jam singer Eddie Velez and Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks, the case was reviewed over and over again prior to their release.

The next documentary is set to air on HBO in January.  Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory is set to premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September but last week’s release is taking the producers back to the editing room to put in the facts of last week’s release of the three who were wrongly convicted.

The three men who were teenagers at the time maintained their innocence since day one of their journey of arrest, conviction and jail time.  And that was the focus of the two prior documentaries Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills and Paradise Lost 2: Revelations.

DNA testing done recently did not connect the three men to the murders.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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You know I always talk a bit about my days in radio.  And I keep up on it regularly with my other company in the radio promotions business though I moved in to the TV world as I could no longer continue to watch the decline of the radio industry.  Shows I’m getting old, right?

But a buddy of mine sent me this link to Entertainment Weekly and one of the more absolutely very cool pieces of content that any radio or even TV person would want to listen and really like.

The link below gives you 5 seconds of music’s blast from the past featuring all of the number 1 hits that were played on radio from 1956 to 1992.

How cool is that?

You’ll hear Dean Martin, Elvis Presley all the way through Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, the Culture Club, oh this is so fantastic for an old music guy.

The Doobie Brothers Performing Live In Concert

Memories in Margate?  Bet you’re wondering what that means, right?  Well there was this old school club down at the Jersey shore back east called Memories.  In Margate.  Put it all together and you have Memories in Margate, a summer oldies hangout owned by legendary Philly radio DJ Jerry Blavat.  Went there one time, to listen to some oldies.   What a blast.

So I leave you with some old school DJ liners.  Cause it’s a summer Sunday, the sun is shining in Cali and I’m listening to some of the world’s greatest music.  A blast from the past, some listen to remember, some listen to forget, sounds so nice gotta play it twice, the bad brotha on the music motha, there is no otha like this soul brotha and finally tall, tanned talented and terrific, the kinda guy that can satisfy!

But listen to the music in the words of the Doobie Brothers.

http://music-mix.ew.com/2011/02/23/every-no-1-song-ever/

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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I haven’t seen the film yet.  But a buddy of mine took his wife to see The Help and said it was fantastic.  I won’t embarrass him by outing him on this blog but he said he was in tears at certain points of the big screen movie.  Now I know I will have to take a person of the other gender with me to see The Help because my buddy says my emotional outburst could lead to an interesting post movie evening and morning for me.

Cicely Tyson in 'The Help'

But The Help is in weekend two and was the number 2 grossing movie during its release a week ago.  And strangely enough it’s expected to be in 1st position for the amount of moviegoers seeing the film this weekend.  Which is a credit to the quality of the movie because very few releases open at number 2 the first weekend and jumped to number 1 on weekend two.

OK lots of numbers but The Help is no doubt headed for big time awards and some really solid TV performers are part of the amazing cast in the movie.

Allison Janney, who spent many years on the NBC drama The West Wing, plays Charlotte Phelan in The Help.  She was on that program for 7 years and 154 episodes playing CJ Cregg.  The West Wing was her biggest television exposure during her career.

The absolutely great Cicely Tyson has been doing television since the early 1960′s.  Doing mostly episodes hits with her last TV role in Law & Order: SVU, Ms, Tyson has one solid resume not only on television but also in the movies and the theater.  She plays Constantine Jefferson in The Help.

Aunjanue Ellis just finished up a recurring role on the CBS show The Mentalist as Agent Madeleine Hightower.  She was the big boss during that series search for the serial killer Red John and was fantastic in the 16 episodes she appeared in last season.

With such a fantastic cast in The Help which also includes Sissy Spacek, Mary Steenburgen and Emma Stone you can’t have a better lineup of talent.  So I’d better get the tissues ready for a lot of tears and look forward to a great night and an even better morning.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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Although I sure would like to be his wing man looking at the picture embedded in this story.

OK let’s get to the story.  Coming soon to a hospital near you…more fat kids.  Now that the quick service restaurant chain has taken its creepy commercial spokesperson and thrown him under a bus, maybe I can check his little black book or his Blackberry to grab those females numbers or e-mail addresses…

Sorry once again. Let’s get back to why there will be more fat kids sucking down soda and fries at Burger King.

For now, the King is dead.  The struggling fast food chain is now dropping its teen targeted spokesperson in favor of a fresh ingredient advertising campaign which will now reach out to mothers.  Yeah, mothers who of course have kids that will consume more fast food junk no matter how fresh the commercials make it look or sound, creating an all new generation of obese, unhealthy children.

Sorry to be so blunt.  But after living in California for the last 7 years I’ve seen too many extremely overweight kids that will eventually be using Obamacare for the rest of their lives.  For some reason I only remember maybe one or two fat kids in grade school or high school.  Really, only one or two.  Today, it’s like over 50% overweight kids in a class.  Ask any teacher.  Way to go Burger King.  Nice re-branding.

The new TV ad campaign starts this weekend on a television program near you.  Burger King’s senior VP of marketing says “people want a reason to go back to Burger King.”  Yeah, I guess to get more plaque in their arteries.

The new ads you will see feature the all new California Whopper.  Hmmm why don’t they call it “two tons of fun!”  So in the commercials you’ll hear some pumpin’ thumpin’ music like a night at the club in Hollywood and Highland’s complex in Hollywood along with the slicing and dicing of fresh ingredients that will fit on to the California Whopper.

Oh yeah and there will be  no voice-over selling you anything.  Just music and fresh ingredients, targeting unsuspecting mothers to take their kids to Burger King rather than soccer practice or baseball at La Cienega Park in Beverly Hills, California.  Oh, I’m sorry that’s right, those kids don’t eat at Burger King.  The kids that will eat their food will be African American and Latino kids from the hood, the two minority groups leading the way in levels of childhood obesity and Type 1 diabetes.

Don’t get me started.  Oh I’m already started.

Let’s hope the only thing with Burger King is their consistent drop in the number of people eating there and the firing of all of the people who run Burger King.

But just to lighten up things for your weekend check out this real funny video from comedian Dane Cook and his first job at Burger King.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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It was a good idea, at least the concept of doing a reality show like Same Name.  David Hasselhoff, Mike Tyson and Reggie Bush along with Joan Rivers, well that may have been a perfect list for maybe Style Network but for CBS the names might not have been strong enough for the summer replacement show Same Name.

Reggie Bush, the NFL star with Reggie Bush the regular guy.

Let’s see we have a rundown, has been in David Hasselhoff.  A broke ex-boxer in Mike Tyson who’d rather play with pigeons, an NFL football player that was jettisoned to the Miami Dolphins to hopefully re-start his fading career and Joan Rivers who I wouldn’t spend a minute of my time even saying her name out loud.

Well that spells cancellation doesn’t it?  And that’s what happened to Same Name as CBS jettisoned the show from their summer schedule in favor of running repeats of The Good Wife.  The show was on Sunday nights at 9PM and failed to find support from viewers, this writer admitting that not one episode was personally viewed.

Two more episodes were on the schedule for the 21 and the 28th of August but those Same Name shows have been sent to the RealTVCritics.com canceled bin.

Rick Thomas

Join RealTVCritics.com now. “Your moment for life!,” says Nicky Minaj!

Omarosa follows RealTVCritics.com to get up to date on really hot TV shows,   Kim Kardashian follows us as well to keep up on really hot reality TV shows, plus hot content on Internet TV and YouTube TV.   Even Yoko Ono is on board with RealTVCritics.com.

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