…but they’ll watch THE L WORD. Gee, I wonder why. The show’s creator Ilene Chaiken, in an interview in the NY Times this weekend, makes passing mention about how popular her show is with straight guys who fast-forward pass the yak-yak-yak and the whine-whine-whine to the hot girl-girl action.
But if everyone agrees that the sex looks good, some have objected
that it looks, well, too good. With classically beautiful actresses
like Jennifer Beals, Pam Grier and Mia Kirschner, Ms. Chaiken
diplomatically said, "There are those viewers who perhaps rightly take
issue with the attractiveness of the cast."The underlying
accusation is that she is playing to men, a charge she says she finds
mildly annoying since she is, after all, creating a show about sexy
young women in Los Angeles, not a documentary about asthmatic mill
workers in Pittsburgh.
I suspect most guys would watch female asthmatic mill workers getting it on… if they all looked as good as Jennifer Beals. What’s wrong with playing to men, too? Ratings are ratings. Of course, Chaikin’s comments imply that lesbians aren’t interested in watching attractive women having sex. I suspect lesbians would watch female asthmatic mill workers going at it, too, if Halle Berry was one of them.
(Shockingly, the wide-ranging discussion didn’t make any mention of the strident demands made by the "Save Karina Lombard" campaign last June. Could it be because nobody is going to miss her?)
As I recall, Jennifer Beals first became a star playing a millworker — although I can’t say she had asthma. But maybe that’s why they needed all those dance doubles for her!
Nah… stars get those no matter what. It’s in the contract.
We supposed to WATCH?
Well, s***.
Nobody knows the full story except the folks who aren’t in a position to be able to divulge secrets… and Karina Lombard is most likely going to cause even more controversy in the future with the release of the first season on dvd and the beginning of the new season on showtime… and there are plenty of straight females watching this show… and by looking at the boards, Karina Lombard is a draw for us straight folks… and the character wasn’t underhanded (anymore than any other human) and did fall in love and grow,… Perhaps some of the controversy is over the concept of beginning a season without key characters… TV is not quite the same as art… TV is alluring on the pretense of being reality… So, I guess for some folks, beginning the season without the Marina character is tantamount to waking up and people have just disappeared from your life… which happens in real lilfe… but we all know… TV isn’t real….
Nobody is going to care if Karina Lombard is on the show or not. It’s an ensemble. I predict Showtime will get the exact same numbers they got last season….or better. Hey, we changed STARS (Gloria Reuben out, Vivica Fox in) on our show MISSING and our viewers stuck with us… we even gained more younger viewers. MONK dropped its co-star and its ratings are better than ever. Television is FULL of examples of shows losing bigger stars than Karina (hell the guy serving donuts on the set is a bigger star than her) and continuing on to even greater success…CHEERS, LAW AND ORDER, MASH, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE, etc. etc.
i’m a straight woman and i like the L owrd and i think Karina Lomabard was doing a great role in the tv show, i don’t know why the producer kick her out, but i hope they can think over about it anc can invited her to the new season.