I Like to Watch

July 22, 2007 | What ever happened to a real summer vacation, the kind where you disappear for a month and the only way anyone can reach you is by boarding two flights, then taking a cab ride, a ferry trip, and a golf cart out to your island bungalow?

I don't want to IM or e-mail or text anyone this summer. I want to spend my summer lolling about in a boozy abyss, not LOL with my co-workers. I want to summer the way those rich people did in "Dirty Dancing" -- drinking gin and tonics and playing bridge and learning to do the bunny hop. I want to recline by the lake, reading a good book and sipping a stiff drink until I pass out and get carried away by giant mosquitoes.

Instead, I'm at the Television Critics Association's tour this week, listening to TV producers say things like, "I've always had a casting director in the U.K." (the Hollywood equivalent of "I've always had a house in the Hamptons") and "We've got a really aggressive schedule in terms of what we're doing with second unit" (the Hollywood equivalent of "My nanny drives the kids around so I can spend my afternoons getting sauced at the Ivy").

Dubious accolade dept.

Yes, I could be strolling on the shore in some fetching sailor-themed outfit like Jackie Onassis right now, but instead, here I am, in the air-conditioned squalor of the Beverly Hilton, surrounded by actresses and publicists and journalists and network executives and similar TV industry bivalves, slurping up strong coffee and TV trivia like this year's Emmy nominations.

The Emmys wouldn't seem quite so trivial if the nominations weren't so bizarre. Check out the nominees for best dramatic series: "The Sopranos," "Heroes," "Grey's Anatomy," "House" and "Boston Legal."

Obviously "The Sopranos" deserves the nomination, and will probably win the Emmy no matter what. Even so, these nominees make no sense. "Grey's Anatomy" is faux-poignant, soapy fluff, "House" is Mr. Toad's Wild Ride for hypochondriacs, and "Boston Legal" should be renamed "Litigating With the Stars," since it's a celebrity circus with David E. Kelley's same old nutrageously un-p.c. high jinks in each ring week after week. Even James Spader has turned into a tiresome ass-grabbing clown in Kelley's hands.

Where the hell is "Friday Night Lights"? You would dare drag Denny Crane into the mix, and not include the most original, heartfelt new drama on TV? And what about "The Wire"? Is this some kind of a practical joke? Does anyone in the Academy even watch TV? If they did, they would feel deeply embarrassed for suggesting that "House" and "Grey's Anatomy" are more deserving of an Emmy than "The Wire" and "Friday Night Lights," not to mention "The Shield" and "Battlestar Galactica."

And how laughable is it to nominate Kiefer Sutherland as best actor in a drama series, given how terrible "24" was last season? Every critic or writer who's ever seen "Friday Night Lights" has marveled over the great acting by Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton, and where is the Academy? Smoking crystal meth in their island bungalows?

Thankfully, "30 Rock," "The Office" and "Ugly Betty" were nominated for best comedy series, but "Weeds" was notably missing, while the painfully unfunny "Two and a Half Men" received its usual nomination.

Expecting the Academy to get it right is sort of like expecting to spend the month of July in sailor-themed outfits, nibbling on seviche and sorting through your shell collection. But that doesn't mean you can't wallow in the terrible injustice of it all. Festering resentment is the spice of life!

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