David E. Kelley (no relation) has a new TV series on NBC tonight: Harry’s Law. Kelley produced Allie McBeal, The Practice, and Boston Legal. Harry’s Law was supposed to be about a cranky, quirky male lawyer, but Kelley and his crew couldn’t find the right actor for the role. Then, they decided to open it up to female actresses and Kathy Bates won the part. I watched the pilot last week. Ho-hum. But Kelley’s creations tend to start out bland and become weird in a hurry once the suits stop observing. I’ve always considered Kathy Bates an underrated actress. I hope this series gives her a chance to really stretch her wings.
I thought parts of last week’s show were idiotic, starting with the setup (the guy trying to commit suicide and landing on her, etc.) and the “gang” members who were really nice guys was silly.
But Kathy Bates is terrific and always worth watching.
I read an article on David E. Kelley and he said he HATES writing pilots for new series, Jeff. Last week’s episode of HARRY’S LAW was the pilot. The “suits” insist on idiotic stuff that Kelley has to put in the script. Hopefully, a lot of the stuff will go away in the following episodes.
I hope so too but I think each series he has done relies more and more on outlandish stunts and less on good writing. So I am not hopeful.
If Kelley’s audience from BOSTON LEGAL follows him to HARRY’S LAW, things should be all right, Patti. And maybe the scripts won’t be so outlandish.
“Outlandish” certainly is a good description of last week’s show. I’m not a lawyer but even I know that “trial” was idiotic – lawyers making speeches rather than asking questions and arguing with each other in front of the jury while the judge sat back and let it go on and on.
I kept waiting to hear, “Douglas Wambaugh for the murderer!”
David E. Kelley takes a lot of liberties with established courtroom procedure, Jeff. Even at the O.J. trial, most of the antics in BOSTON LEGAL and HARRY’S LAW would have been flagged.
I was going to watch it, but the thing began at 10:00 and I was pretty sure I’d fall asleep before the end. I hate being an old guy, but it seems to have happened while I wasn’t looking.
That’s why DVRs were invented, Rick. We record just about everything (other than sporting events) and zip through the commercials.
I already have to pay the Comcast Thugs a couple hundred a month, for the same set of services I had with Cox for half that. Everything is proprietary. For for the HD set I have to rent the HD box ($9), plus the HD channel fee ($9) plus an HD “processing fee” ($7)! Renting a DVR would add another $15 a month. Bah.
You could always buy your own DVR, Rick. They’ve come way down in price.
I’m with George on this one, Rick. The DVR is totally worth it. As a matter of fact it will be difficult for us to do without it for 5 weeks in Florida. We record pretty much everything except live sports. Skip the commercials. If the phone rings while you’re watching the news or the playoffs, just hit pause. If you miss a story on the news or want to review a key play just rewind.
That’s exactly what Diane and I do with our DVR, Jeff. Saves tons of time.
Kelley one of my least favorites, too…despite liking Bates, I suspect I won’t like this. ALLY MCBEAL, fwiw.
David E. Kelley is a quirky producer, Todd. He has his followers who stayed loyal to him from ALLY MCBEAL to THE PRACTICE to BOSTON LEGAL. If you like surrealism, you might like HARRY’S LAW.
I do like surrealism, but not Kelley’s form of it…LA LAW or PICKET FENCES, either.
I liked the surrealism of TWIN PEAKS, Todd, until it went over the cliff.
Of course, it’s easy to resentfully envy Michelle Pfeiffer’s husband…
Michelle Pfeiffer…CATWOMAN…purrrrrr