When HBO’s Oz originally aired, I gave it a miss. I think I was burned out on prison-set movies at the time. That’s unfortunate since it was a great show. The show’s  executive producers were Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana who [...]]]> Been watching a couple of series I hadn’t seen before, one older and one current:

When HBO’s Oz originally aired, I gave it a miss. I think I was burned out on prison-set movies at the time. That’s unfortunate since it was a great show. The show’s  executive producers were Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana who were both involved in Homicide. While that show was groundbreaking for a network series, you could tell it was straining against the limits imposed by that environment. Oz was HBO’s first hour long dramatic series and it certainly set the stage for other gritty shows like The Sopranos and The Wire which would come later.

The show follows the story of Tobias Beecher, a lawyer imprisoned for killing a child while driving drunk. He finds himself in Oswald State Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison. All of the standard prison themes are examined here: violence, racial tension, drug addiction, homosexuality, rape. It’s a tribute to the writing and the acting that this show remained fresh and watchable for six seasons.

One of my favourite things about the show is recognizing all of the actors who have passed through my other favourite tv shows like Homicide and The Wire. There is no shortage of crossover here.

The other show I’ve been watching is more recent, the FX comedy It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia. It’s about four “friends” (actually three friends and a sister) who own an Irish dive bar in Philly. It’s like Curb Your Enthusiasm only with 4 or 5 misanthropes instead of just one (Danny Devito joined the cast in the second season; imagine his nasty Louie character from Taxi transplanted to a bar environment). This show is like the anti-Cheers. The characters are constantly backstabbing each other, running each other down and just generally being complete a**holes. And like Curb, no subject is taboo for laughs. Definitely check this out if you haven’t.

I recently watched this biopic about them and really enjoyed it. I’d never really listened to their music although I’m a big Joan Jett fan. “I Love Rock N’ Roll” is one of my favourite songs of all time and “Bad Reputation” is pretty awesome too. The Runaways were kind of like the Sex Pistols [...]]]>

I recently watched this biopic about them and really enjoyed it. I’d never really listened to their music although I’m a big Joan Jett fan. “I Love Rock N’ Roll” is one of my favourite songs of all time and “Bad Reputation” is pretty awesome too. The Runaways were kind of like the Sex Pistols in that originally they were a manufactured band that got away from their svengali (in this case, Kim Fowley).

I subsequently also watched Edgeplay, a documentary about the band. It was interesting but with Joan Jett not participating, incomplete. Sort of like documentaries about Apple with no Steve Jobs. Kim Fowley comes off as even more of a bastard in this one than in the Hollywood version.