Do you love a TV show… that everyone else hates?

Image Credit: Brian Bowen Smith/FoxIt’s been a week since the news broke, and I’m still devastated that Fox won’t be ordering more episodes of Running Wilde. The show wasn’t perfect by a long shot, and it definitely felt quite a bit like the creators were trying to fit the comedy of Arrested Development into a more conventional sitcom. But the show was improving week-by-week, thanks a zippy co-lead performance by Keri Russell. Plus, the supporting cast was incredible (especially Peter Serafinowicz’s Fa’ad, a character who came thiseclose to offensive but instead became a walking joke of excessive decadence.) No one will believe me, but I thought Running Wilde was the funniest new show this season (besides Hawaii Five-0, of course.) PopWatchers, do you know my pain? Have you ever experienced the pain of loving a show that everyone else despised?

For some reason, when I was a kid, I mostly kept the TV set turned to the channels that played Simpsons reruns, which meant that during my early formative years I almost exclusively watched two networks: UPN and The WB. So I’m not joking when I say that, for a brief and terrible moment, my favorites shows on TV were Star Trek: Voyager, Unhappily Ever After, and Homeboys In Outer Space. I can blame those loves on youthful indiscretion (although I still adore the Bobcat Goldthwait rabbit from Unhappily Ever After).

Less easy to explain is my fervent adoration — addiction, really — to HBO’s unfondly remembered surf-noir/religious-parable John From Cincinnati. The show, which had the misfortune to debut immediately after the series finale of The Sopranos, has practically become a shorthand for travesty TV. But I came to the series a year after its ignoble cancellation… and I was instantly hooked. I devoured all ten episodes in under one week.

The thing is, I can’t quite explain why I enjoy the show. It’s slow, ponderous, and apparently nonsensical. One of the characters, a teenager, seems to age five years in one season (which is especially noticeable, since the whole season covers just a week and a half of real time.) Bruce Greenwood, nominally the main character, disappears for most of the season. I practically cried during the final episode, but I had no clue what was going on. (It either had something to do with the Iraq war, or with the corruption of the surfing industry.) It’s a bit like Lost In Translation: Everything the haters say is totally true, but I could still watch it forever.

PopWatchers, are there shows you love that everyone else can’t stand? Is it because they’re all stupid, or are you just way cooler than them? Any other John From Cincinnati lovers want to help explain why the show is so much better than its reputation?

Read more:
‘Running Wilde’: Fox not running back nine episodes
Fox benches ‘Running Wilde’ for November sweeps
‘Running Wilde’: Did you watch it? Are you sad it’s not ‘Arrested Development’?
In defense of ‘John From Cincinnati’

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Xmas music: Your playlist?

Every year for the past decade-and-a-half or so, I’ve sent out a Christmas music compilation CD as my holiday card to friends and family. It’s typically about 20 tracks of “traditional” Christmas songs (so Weezer’s “Silent Night” could be on there, but not “Santa Claus Goes Straight to the Ghetto” by Snoop’s Dogg Pound), because those are the classics that get me all warm and fuzzy around the time the trees go bare and the gas bill goes up. For the first few years it was a piece of cake. Vince Guaraldi’s Charlie Brown Christmas CD showed up every year, as did gems from collections by Frank Sinatra, Etta James, James Taylor, and Tony Bennett. But a CD greeting card that goes out each and every year, basically containing renditions of the same relatively small pool of songs, desperately needs variety to make it worthwhile year in and year out. As time went by, that became a real challenge. Run DMC’s “Christmas in Hollis” is awesome, but those well-known one-off-type tracks will make your compilations seem gimmicky if they keep showing up every year. To keep it interesting, you gotta find the deep cuts – and keep finding them year in and year out, despite the limited number of new Christmas CDs entering the picture each year.

In this ongoing hunt over the years, I’ve found some really wonderful music, though, and figured this weekend, as we kick off the official holiday season, I’d share a few of my favorites (some albums, some individual songs). This is in hopes that you, EW.com readers, will share yours with me (more fodder for next year’s collection – the Holiday 2010 mix is already a wrap). So without further ado, in no particular order:

The Ventures’ Christmas Album, by surf-rock group The Ventures
Christmas Cookin’, by too-damn-funky jazz organist Jimmy Smith
Singing Saw at Christmastime, by Neutral Milk Hotel’s Julian Koster
Psychobilly Christmas, various artists (especially Reverend Horton Heat’s actually kinda mellowed out “We Three Kings”)
The Nutcracker Suite, by Duke Ellington
Boas Festas, by Japanese-Brazilian bossa nova singer Lisa Ono
“The Little Drum Machine Boy,” by Beck, off the Sleighed: The Other Side of Christmas compilation
“Merry Muthaf*ckin’ Xmas,”  by Eazy E, off his 5150 EP
Hawaiian Slack Key Christmas, various artists (pretty awesome guitar work here)
Navidad Cubana, a hot, studio-live set from Cuba L.A.

Your turn.

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Thanksgiving parade round-up: Highs, lows, and some seriously grating promos

Image Credit: Charles Sykes/AP ImagesHappy Thanksgiving, PopWatchers. And for those of you not in the U.S., happy plain old Thursday! This year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York just wrapped up, and as usual, there were balloons and songs and constant, constant shilling for NBC shows. (I tried watching the CBS coverage for a little while, but it was too boring.)

Highlights
++ Arlo Guthrie, in a badass jacket, singing “This Land Is Your Land.” Why was there a child dressed as a skunk right next to him? I don’t know, but I loved it.

++ The massive cheerleader performance. More like this, please!

++ Kanye West wearing an Ewok-fur vest and some kind of lamé tunic — you know, traditional Thanksgiving gear. My love for him knows no bounds.

++ Meredith Vieira saying “ooooh yeaaah” like the Kool-Aid guy. It was so forced and strange that it created an unlikely moment of hilarity.

++ All the aerial shots of the marching bands changing formation. Whatever, simple pleasures, don’t you dare judge me.

++ The staggeringly strange “Ice Queen” float with Joan Rivers. I was getting sort of bored with the sameness of all the floats, and this really bucked that trend. Why a chariot pulled by a team of horses?

++ The new balloon of Virginia, the little girl whose letter garnered the famous “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” editorial

Lowlights
++ Why did Matt Lauer have to keep calling Jessica Simpson “beautiful”? Not that she isn’t beautiful — whatever floats your boat — but is that really part of someone’s intro? It seems sort of degrading. I wonder if a male performer would be repeatedly referred to in this context as handsome.

++ This year’s Broadway performances seemed particularly strained. Sorry, American Idiot. And Elf. Yeesh.

++ NBC, stop trying to make The Sing-Off happen. I secretly like that show, and even I could not stomach all the promos.

What did you think of the parade, PopWatchers? Did any of the floats or balloons surprise and delight you, or were you too distracted by the sad, promo-y copy all the anchors had to read?

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Ivanka Trump blogs ‘The Apprentice’: Episode 11

Image Credit: Virginia Sherwood/NBCHi Apprentice fans! Happy Thanksgiving – I hope that you all enjoyed your Thanksgiving evening and your latest dose of The Apprentice. This week’s episode was one of the most intense of the season, with the pressure on, and the game-playing at an all time high! I am excited to share my thoughts with you and hear what you think.

Keep it Flexible
I was thrilled for Steuart as he got the chance to meet Cathie Black, Chairman of Hearst Magazines, NYC’s next school chancellor, and contributor to my book, The Trump Card. In my opinion, she is one of the most intelligent, forward thinking and accomplished women business leaders today. Steuart was a quick study, and I think that he got a lot out of his meeting with Cathie, particularly that quality is always better than quantity in every business. Thanks to Cathie for her always terrific advice.

Back to the Battle of the Sexes
For this week’s task, the teams were returned to men vs. women, which I knew would prove to be an interesting dynamic. With only 4 players left, there was nowhere left to hide, and everyone had to put their best foot forward…and then some.

With Don and I unavailable for this task, my father had to rely on Juan Bettencourt and Catherine Roman, the noted head hunters, in a return appearance. Once they came on board, you could sense the added pressure of impressing both my father and the headhunters. The choices for PMs were obvious – Liza would head up Fortitude, and Clint would lead Octane. I was most interested to see how Liza would do, as she had taken such a background role all season. I was hoping she would step up and show some mettle!

Game-play
The task – to sell Isaac Mizrahi’s products on QVC – seemed like it would give both teams the opportunity to shine – both Clint and Steuart are strong salesman and Brandy has thus far been one of the strongest presenters this season. However, the task itself was not the highlight of the episode – game-play was. Clint turned out to be quite the strategist, first throwing Steuart off his game with verbal jabs on the helicopter (saying Steuart was too immature to be the Apprentice and that he was like a little brother) and giving the ladies what he thought was a disadvantage.

When it came time to choose which product to sell, Brandy and Liza wanted to sell watches, and they thought that the men wanted to sell the handbags. While Clint made it appear like that was what the men wanted, they actually were just focused on securing the better time slot. They let the women pick their product first, ensuring the men of obtaining the choice of second slot. Great move! As Catherine Roman said, “Clint had clear strategy, and he dominated the negotiation.” Clint is always a perfect gentleman, but it was fun to see the gloves come off.

Show Time
Liza turned out to be a strong player in this task – making decisions based on research and past experience. Her choice of Brandy as a presenter was well justified because she has been well received in the past. It was a solid strategy on Liza’s part and I was impressed. Part of being strong in business is being able to identify other people’s strength and delegate responsibility accordingly. Liza was truly the underdog here, and I liked that she was finally confident in her choices and able to implement them.

Both Clint and Liza illustrated the ambition and strength needed to win The Apprentice – I expected this performance from Clint, but it was truly a game changer for Liza. With Brandy and Steaurt presenting, and Clint and Liza strategizing – this was going to be a tough one to call.

The Sweet Spot
When my father and Isaac Mizrahi met to view the footage – it seemed that the teams had made the same mistake on opposite ends – both had priced the product wrong. Isaac is an incredible salesman and so well-versed in this area of retail that it must have driven him crazy to see that the sales “sweet spot” was missed!

The Boardroom
Finally, the boardroom turned out to be a positive place for Liza. When my father questioned her decision not to present, she explained that the QVC audience is 85% Caucasian according to the demographics and therefore felt that Brandy was a more obvious choice. My father said it was a big statement but that he respected her honesty, and subsequent strategy, and you could tell that he was happy to see that she had stepped up to the plate.

At the end of the day, however, it was the sales that mattered, and with all of Clint’s game-play, the women still ended up beating the men! Congratulations to Liza – she couldn’t have picked a better time to show her strong side and win. I am proud of her!

Fire #12
This fire was a hard one, as they always are at the end of the season. Both Steuart and Clint have been great players throughout the show, but at the end of the day, my father thought Clint would be the stronger of the two. Steuart was fired.

As my father said, I truly believe that there were no “losers” on this episode, but someone had to go home. Steuart has done a stellar job throughout the show and I have no doubt he will continue to meet with success. I wish him the best of luck.

See you in the Boardroom next week! Happy Thanksgiving weekend!

For More of Your Apprentice Fix
If you need more of your Apprentice fix, and want additional behind the scenes info, LIKE my Facebook page.

If you want advice from visionaries such as Cathie Black, find out more about my book, The Trump Card at Amazon.com.

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Timeless Alchemy, Even When No One Is Dancing - New York Times

His “Nutcracker” (1954) — designer-labeled these days as “George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker” — returned to the David H. Koch Theater on Friday night for New York City Ballet’s annual Christmas season, with Clotilde Otranto conducting a lean, febrile account of Tchaikovsky’s score. The most perfect example of how much more Balanchine gives us to see, and therefore to hear in the music, than any other dance version occurs in the Act II Waltz of the Flowers. Steps, lines, rhythms and formations occur at dazzling frequency, and the speed of the Dewdrop soloist within her music is often bewildering. In consequence, we see, hear — breathe — faster.

Act I of his “Nutcracker” is even more gripping in human and dance details, reaching its peak in the accumulating miracle of the Waltz of the Snowflakes. On the way there, however, four nondance scenes make the drama altogether larger. They make the audience ask, “What’s happening?” More than that, they give intimations of transcendence.

The first of these is the overture, where nothing happens except the music. Yet the front cloth shows us elements that soar over all that follows: the snow-clad roofs of Nuremberg, a super-bright star and a winged angel.

The angel’s flight suggests the Annunciation; the star recalls the Nativity. No, this is not going to be a Nuremberg version of the Christ child story. But the imagery prepares us for both Christmas Eve and divine agency.

The next of these nondance scenes is to music interpolated from “The Sleeping Beauty”: an entr’acte featuring solo violin. True, this spoils the continuity of Tchaikovsky’s entrancingly seamless score, and the music really has non-“Nutcracker” ideas. But Balanchine takes these ideas to deepen the whole “Nutcracker” world and offers a human-size echo of the overture’s images of angelic vigilance and magical intervention.

The child Marie comes to gather her beloved Nutcracker in her arms before she goes to sleep; then her mother arrives to find her and in turn protect her from the night’s chill with a shawl; and finally Marie’s godfather, Drosselmeier, arrives to survey the scene and to inspect (and prepare) the Nutcracker he gave Marie for purposes as yet undivulged. Balanchine simply lets this violin meditation cast a spell deeper than his stage action explains; I love best that for a moment nothing happens onstage at all, so that we just listen in suspense while the violin suggests the sleeper’s vision, organic inner growth and transcendent beauty.

Soon there follows the most celebrated scene change in all ballet. The room grows outsize, and the Christmas tree rises volcanically upward out of the ground until the star is out of sight. (When Balanchine was preparing this production in 1954, colleagues anxious about the expense proposed that he stage the ballet without the ascending tree. He’s said to have replied, essentially, the ballet is the Christmas tree.)

Balanchine’s timing of the events that precede and follow his tree’s growth is unmatched. We’ve already lived through Marie’s heart-racing excitement at discovering that the toy soldiers have become as large as she. Now the tree rises while she, right before it, clutches the ballet’s tiny protagonist to her heart. And the scene’s Wonderland climax occurs not when the tree stops growing, but when that very Nutcracker, after vanishing offstage, returns — now her size too.

What theatrical marvel could surpass this? Well, the very next scene change (after the battle between mice and soldiers). Tchaikovsky has already created music of metamorphosis. Now he suggests transfiguration.

You can hear why most choreographers can’t resist setting this as a dance — in most cases as an exultantly romantic pas de deux (heroine with her transformed Nutcracker, Snow King and Queen, whoever). Any mere duet, however, is going to look tritely overambitious beside this ever-rising tide of musical wonder. Balanchine, with no dance at all, supplies far more meaning. And he shows how Tchaikovsky is Wagner’s only equal in creating scene-change music that is sublimely dramatic.

The scene starts with the Nutcracker triumphant but as yet unredeemed, and his academic dance gesture — tendu side, with arms open wide — is among the strangest in dance theater because its formal radiance clashes with his large, immobile head. Then he, becoming the next figure to guard the sleeping Marie after her mother and Drosselmeier, summons the bed on which she lies to follow him; magically, it obeys.

New scenery arrives, swag after swag; the Nutcracker walks offstage but the bed remains, circling as if in a vortex, until the stage has fully become the Land of Snow and the Nutcracker returns. Now at last we see him transformed, shedding his Nutcracker surface like a husk, revealing the elegant princeling within, and he strikes again that proclamatory tendu-side gesture.

At Friday’s performance some of the foppish glee Robert La Fosse displayed as Drosselmeier at the party could be questioned, but this is the interpretative choice of an enjoyably lively stage artist. Children, corps de ballet and soloists all did admirably, with especially fine contributions from Marie (Fiona Brennan), Fritz (Gregor MacKenzie Gillen) and Soldier (Troy Schumacher).

This didn’t feel, however, like an opening night. Jenifer Ringer, as the Sugar Plum Fairy, looked as if she’d eaten one sugar plum too many; and Jared Angle, as the Cavalier, seems to have been sampling half the Sweet realm. They’re among the few City Ballet principals who dance like adults, but without adult depth or complexity. Ashley Bouder (Dewdrop) has the brilliance they lack, but also a greater and more tough-grained hardness. Even Teresa Reichlen (as Coffee), often one of the company’s freshest and most multidimensional dancers, performed with a glassiness I don’t recall. And Ms. Otranto’s conducting lacked the moment-by-moment rapport with her dancers that turns a safe performance into a tingling one.

“George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker” continues through Jan. 2 at the David H. Koch Theater, Lincoln Center; nycballet.org.

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What was your worst holiday movie-going experience?

I love going to see films during the holidays. Is there anything better than stretching out in a darkened cinema and watching some mindless, big-budget Hollywood movie while suffering from a Thanksgiving Day food coma or New Year’s Day hangover (other, of course, than doing the things that put you in those film-welcoming states in the first place)? I think not!

But things don’t always go to plan. Three years ago, I spent Thanksgiving Day dog-sitting my friends’ beagle-basset George, a hound with the noble good looks of a Roman aristocrat and the demented temperament of the emperor Caligula. I’m not kidding. The list of things that sets George off into a howling, maniacal frenzy merely begins with squirrels, skateboarders, and dogs with pointy ears (i.e. around 50 percent of all other dogs). He is also deliberately incontinent, by which I mean that the moment you leave the apartment he takes it upon himself to decorate the place with his “business” like he’s getting paid by the pound. Frankly, the amount this dog defecates is unbelievable — or at least it would seem that way if you were unaware that he will eat anything that is, or is not, nailed down.

After a thrill-filled morning of yelping (on his part) and waste disposal (on mine), I fled, sans George, to a nearby cinema to see Southland Tales, the second film by writer-director Richard Kelly after his sublime Donnie Darko. To say the confusing, shambling, and unfunny Southland did not live up to the standard of Darko is putting matters mildly indeed. To be honest, I would rather have been clearing up dog poop, although, as I discovered upon returning home, this wasn’t an “either/or” situation.

Desperate to cleanse my cinematic palette, and once again escape George’s guttural yammering, I returned to the multiplex that evening in search of something to turn my now-quite possibly feces-speckled frown upside-down. What I found instead was Frank Darabont’s Stephen King adaptation The Mist, a horror film with an ending so shockingly downbeat and depressing that, had I encountered Darabont in the foyer afterwards, I would have been sorely tempted to punch him in the face. (I recently had the opportunity to relate this reaction to Walking Dead head honcho Darabont himself, who didn’t seem the least surprised. I also pointed out, truthfully, that after several more viewings I now regarded The Mist as an extremely under-appreciated, if not exactly Thanksgiving-friendly, venture.)

How could things get worse? They couldn’t. Unless, of course I were to return home to find George had left another present for me on the floor (which he had) and then, while I was distracted cleaning that up, the damn dog ate the tragic turkey sandwich I had bought for my Thanksgiving Day dinner (which he did).

I should probably point out that I do love the little guy and continue to dog-sit him at the drop of a doubtless-soon-to-be-pooped-on hat. But that isn’t going to stop me posting the hilariously embarrassing photo below.

So much for my worst pop culture holiday experience. What about yours?

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Spotted! Taylor and Jake Cozy Up in Nashville - People Magazine

Taylor Swift and Jake Gyllenhaal

Courtesy Emma Rice

It's been a busy travel weekend for most Americans – and especially for Taylor Swift and Jake Gyllenhaal.

Two days after enjoying maple lattes together in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Thanksgiving, Swift and Gyllenhaal popped up in the singer's hometown of Nashville.

On Saturday afternoon, the couple were spotted getting a late breakfast at Fido, a coffeehouse and café near Vanderbilt University and Music Row.

"They were smiling and laughing. They were talking a lot and enjoying each other's company," fellow diner Elaina Mishu tells PEOPLE. "They didn't look like [just] friends."

Customer Emma Rice, who snapped a photo of the pair, calls the duo "very cute" and says, "They seemed close."

The singer, 20, and actor, 29, were first spotted together in late October.

And while Gyllenhaal has avoided commenting on his relationship with Swift, they aren't hiding their affection.

"They were not trying to be discreet by any means," another eyewitness says of the pair, who sat at a table near a window. "They were definitely a couple. They looked very happy."

• With additional reporting by KAY WEST

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