TV Star Spotlight: Jenny Slate

It seems lately that Jenny Slate, the short-lived SNL star from the 2009/2010 season, has been popping up all over our TV screen. So we thought we'd take a look back at some of our favorite Jenny Slate TV appearances (plus one viral viral video sensation)!  Check it out:

We first saw Jenny Slate on the Late Night with Jimmy Fallon's recurring series 7th Floor West, a spot-on parody of The Hills.  Jenny played Jenny, an NBC page who Jimmy finds attractive and eventually hires to be his assistant:

That bit must have caught the eye of Lorne Michaels (who is the executive producer of both SNL and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon) because shortly after that Jenny was cast on Saturday Night Live.  Though she only lasted one year, we were always big fans of her work on the show, especially her recurring character of Tina Tina Chanuse:

After leaving SNL, Jenny created the adorable viral video sensation "Marcel the Shell with Shoes On". Jenny co-wrote the film and voices the titular character of Marcel, a tiny shell wearing shoes.  The video was so successful (it has over 20 million views on YouTube) that it later spawned a sequel video and even a hardcover book.  Check out the original "Marcel the Shell with Shoes On" and the sequel below:

Our New Favorite Show: Billy on the Street!

Originally a web series on Funny Or Die, Billy on the Street has made it to the big(ger) screen on the Fuse network. Billy Eichner is a man with opinions who isn't afraid to yell at strangers and/or give them money when they can correctly answer questions and/or agree with him. But at his core, he's a man who wants answers, and wants them NOW. Never before has such urgency been applied to such low-stakes challenges ("for $1, name 3 white people"). He's also friends with some famous people that we like, which is nice. Here's a clip of him with Rashida Jones as well as a series of people on the streets of NYC who don't seem to know Rashida Jones nor watch Parks and Rec.

Billy On The Street 2nd Season Exclusive Clip with Rashida Jones from Rashida Jones

Golden Globe Nominations Announced! Our Official Picks!

Today the nominations for the 70th Golden Globe Awards were announced!  As you might expect, we care most about the TV comedy categories, so here are the nominations for each of those categories, and our picks for who we think should win!

Best Television Series - Musical or Comedy

• The Big Bang Theory
• Episodes
• Girls
• Modern Family
• Smash

Sadly, many of our favorites like 30 Rock, The Office, Parks & Recreation, Community,  and Louie weren't nominated this year.  Out of the 5 that were, the only one we actually watch is Modern Family, so we'll have to vote for that one.  Modern Family is a truly hilarious show with an amazing ensemble made up of both adults and kids.  Modern Family won last year, so hopefully it wins again!  Here's a great clip from a recent episode with guest star Matthew Broderick, who gets mixed signals from Phil:

Best Actor in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy

• Alec Baldwin - 30 Rock
• Don Cheadle - House of Lies
• Louis C.K. - Louie
• Matt LeBlanc - Episodes
• Jim Parsons - The Big Bang Theory

As much as we love Alec Baldwin on 30 Rock, we're rooting for Louis C.K. Alec Baldwin has already won the award 3 times now (Matt LeBlanc and Jim Parsons have also each won) so it would really be nice to see Louis C.K. get some recognition.  While I'll readily admit that when it comes to acting, Louis doesn't have much of a range, he is really great at playing the fictionalized version of himself that he wrote for himself on Louie, as evidenced in this clip:

Community Gets Return Date!

Back when NBC's fall lineup was first announced last summer, the 4th season premier of Community was scheduled to premier on Friday October 19th.  However, as we previously reported, a few weeks before Community was scheduled to return NBC decided to delay the return indefinitely.  In the interim  the Greendale 7 released the following video:

   

Well, now it looks like October 19th will be on February 7th!  NBC is now announcing that the 4th season of Community will premier on February 7th in its old Thursday night 8:00pm time slot which will become available after the shortened final season of 30 Rock ends its run.  

It was also reported that the new white house comedy 1600 Penn (starring Book of Mormon's Josh Gad) will premier on Thursday January 10th at 9:30pm.  The following Thursday on January 17th, Parks & Rec will move to its new 8:30 time slot, taking over for Up All Night, which as we reported yesterday will be going on hiatus as it transitions to a multi-camera sitcom.  It seems like The Office will finish up its final season in its usual Thursday night at 9:00pm time slot. Here's a trailer for the new NBC comedy 1600 Penn:

Louis C.K. to Host SNL!

Louis C.K. on Parks & Recreation

At the end of the summer, I put together a list of 10 people I'd like to see host Saturday Night Live for the first time this season.  Guest Blogger Daniel made his own top 10 wishlist for new SNL hosts.  And now, six episodes in, one of these 20 individuals will finally be hosting.  Comedian Louis C.K. (from my list! Point: me) will be hosting the next episode of SNL on November 3.  Before this summer, I primarily knew Louis C.K. as Dave, Leslie Knope's cop boyfriend in a few episodes of Parks & Rec.  But this summer, after hearing a lot of buzz, we finally decided to start watching Louis C.K.'s hit TV series Louie, and we were hooked.  (When I say "start watching", I naturally mean we bought seasons 1 and 2 on DVD and watched them in succession before watching season 3 each week when it aired on TV.  We would never just start watching a show without watching from the beginning.  Obviously.)  I have been wanting to blog about Louie since we started watching it this summer, but I just didn't know what to say about it.  It's the most fascinating and unique show on television. There is literally nothing on TV like it.  It's a comedy, but it's not always funny.  Some episodes contain two short unrelated stories, while other stories take up one, two, or even three episodes.  Sometimes the show features Louis performing standup between each segment, and other episodes feature no standup at all.  The show usually begins with its opening sequence and theme song, but other times it's gone altogether.  The point is that Louie is no ordinary sitcom, just like Louis C.K. is no ordinary sitcom star.  For this reason, despite being a hilarious comedian, he might not make a great SNL host.

Clip of the Day: Ron's Barbecue

This Thursday we finally saw the return of our favorite NBC comedies!  There were lots of great clips from each of the four shows, but our favorite of the night would have to be this clip from Parks & Rec of Ron describing his ideal barbecue:

TV Shows Returning!

Tomorrow is the big day!  The Thursday night NBC comedies finally return to TV!  And while we're always excited for the return of of favorite TV shows after the long summer hiatus, it seems that this year each show is going through some big changes that are really getting us excited.  So to get you all excited for the big season premiers tomorrow night, (as well as a few in the upcoming weeks), here's a rundown of why we're excited for some of our favorite shows to return!

NOTE: While we will be talking about the upcoming seasons of shows, this post will NOT contain spoilers of the upcoming season.  I am firmly against spoilers of any kind, as I believe it ruins the fun and unexpected nature of watching a show.  (I don't even watch the commercials on TV for the episode coming up next.)  HOWEVER, this post WILL spoil last season.  Many of the shows had big cliff hangers at the end of last season, so I will be bringing you up to speed on where we left off and why we're excited for next season.  This post is intended to refresh your memory of where we left off, not to spoil it for those who haven't seen it yet.  So if  you don't watch any of these shows or are currently watching any of the shows below on DVD for the first time and haven't fully caught up, please do not read that section, as I don't want to spoil it for you.

Amy Poehler and Will Arnett Separate

We don't usually report on celebrity relationship news here, but this news was just so shocking that we had couldn't help it.  TV stars Amy Poehler (Saturday Night Live, Parks and Recreation) and Will Arnett (Arrested Development, 30 Rock, Up All Night) are separating after 9 years of marriage.  The separation was said to be "amicable".  They have 2 young children.

While it's pretty common to see celebrity couples breakup, I really thought Amy and Will would make it.  They're both such talented and funny people, and they seemed truly happy whenever they were seen together.  They also often acted together, appearing in each other's TV shows, which only added to the fun the couple seemed to be having together.

However, in retrospect, when they appeared together on screen they usually played a very dysfunctional couple.  I suppose at the time it was funny because we knew they were happily married in real life, but now, going back and watching those old clips is just pretty sad.

TV Star Spotlight: Aziz Ansari

I know we just posted about last night's season finale of Saturday Night Live, but we didn't actually watching it yet (don't worry, we DVRed it.  No spoilers!).  That's because last night, we had tickets to see standup from the one and only Aziz Ansari!  Currently, Aziz stars on the NBC comedy Parks & Recreation, but he has actually been on many other TV shows in the past.  So let's take a look back at some of our favorite Aziz appearances.

Aziz Ansari's first major TV appearance was as one of the three creators and stars of the MTV sketch comedy show Human Giant.   Co-created with Paul Scheer and Rob Huebel, the show ran for 2 seasons on MTV, and featured the trio appearing in various sketches (many of them recurring throughout episodes), along with some pretty great guest stars.  This first sketch is from a recurring sketch called "Shutterbugs", which features Aziz and Rob Huebel as managers of a child talent agency.  Special guest appearance by Bobb'e J. Thomas (Role Models, Tracy Jr. on 30 Rock).

Here's another recurring sketch from Human Giant called "Illusionators", a parody of Criss Angel's Mindfreak, featuring a guest appearance from Rob Riggle (SNL, Daily Show).

After Human Giant, Aziz took on many guest starring roles on TV shows, such as his recurring role as Ed the Intern in season 8 of Scrubs.  Here's a little compilation of some of his best scenes:

Aziz also had a memorable appearance on the HBO comedy Flight of the Conchords as a racist fruit vendor.

And now, Aziz stars on the hit NBC comedy Parks and Recreation as Tom Haverford:

But Aziz has done much more than just television.  He has appeared in many movies, such as I Love You Man, The Rocker, Get Him to the Greek, Funny People (as alter ego RAAAAAAAANDY), and his first starring role in last summer's 30 Minutes or Less.  

But in addition to acting, Aziz is also a great stand-up (hence we got tickets to see him).  In his signature style, he has talked about a wide range of topics, such as marriage and children, stories about Kanye West and R Kelly, making fun of his cousins Harris and Darwish, thread counts on luxery linens, and buying ice cream at Cold Stone Creamery. Aziz released his first Comedy Central special Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening in 2010.  Here's the cleanest clip we could find from the special: (other clips are funnier, but we try to keep this site relatively clean.  You can check out tons of other Aziz standup clips on YouTube)

Aziz's second special, Dangerously Delicious, will make its TV debut tonight (May 20) at 10:00pm on Comedy Central.  But, for just $5 you can download the extended, uncensored version on Aziz's website. We bought it, and it was hysterical. Well worth the $5!

And last night, we were in attendance for Aziz's 3rd comedy show, Buried Alive.  It was a really funny show, and great to finally get to see Aziz live.  If you want to catch him on tour, check out his tour dates!  Highly recommended!

BREAKING NEWS: NBC Fall Schedule Released!

Moments ago, NBC released their Fall 2012 Schedule. The big news is that The Office will indeed be returning for a 9th season, joining previously announced renewed series 30 Rock, Parks & Recreation, Community, and Up All Night.  Interestingly, it looks like Community is moving to Friday nights (oddly paired with the surprisingly renewed Whitney), with 30 Rock, Up All Night, The Office, and Parks & Rec staying on Thursday nights.  Regardless, we're just happy that all our favorite NBC comedies are coming back, and we'll still have our 2 hour comedy block every Thursday night.  Check out the full NBC Fall Schedule below from TVLine.  Shows in blue are new, and you can click on them to learn more about them.

MONDAY
8/7c The Voice
10 pm REVOLUTION

TUESDAY
8 pm The Voice
9 pm GO ON
9:30 pm THE NEW NORMAL
10 pm Parenthood

WEDNESDAY
8 pm ANIMAL PRACTICE
8:30 pm GUYS WITH KIDS
9 pm Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
10 pm CHICAGO FIRE

THURSDAY
8 pm 30 Rock
8:30 pm Up All Night
9 pm The Office
9:30 pm Parks and Recreation
10 pm Rock Center with Brian Williams

FRIDAY
8 pm Whitney
8 pm Community
9 pm Grimm
10-11 pm Dateline NBC

SATURDAY
Encore programming

SUNDAY
7 pm Football Night in America
8:15 pm NBC Sunday Night Football

SUNDAY (Post-football/Winter 2013)
7 pm Dateline NBC
8 pm Fashion Star
9 pm The Celebrity Apprentice
10 pm DO NO HARM

NOT RETURNING NEXT SEASON: Are You There, Chelsea?, Awake, Bent, Best Friends Forever, Chuck, Free Agents, Harry’s Law, The Playboy Club, Prime Suspect and The Firm.

Champion the 3-Legged Dog on The Office

While watching The Office this week, we were very surprised to see a very familiar face.  No, I'm not talking about former Dunder Mifflin CFO David Wallce (though that was a very fun surprise!), I'm talking about Champion, April and Andy's 3-legged dog from Parks & Recreation.  Though he was only on screen for a few seconds, and his 3 legs weren't  visible, his distinct brown-spotted face was unmistakably Champion.  You can see him in the bottom left corner in the first few seconds of the clip below, as well as a few other times in the background.   So here's Champion on The Office!

And here's Champion on Parks & Recreation.

Who Dat Ninja? - President of Pawnee's Seniors United

A few weeks ago, this old man appeared on an episode of Parks & Recreation as Ned Jones, the President of Pawnee Seniors United.  While this man may not be recognizable to most, he is actually a comedy legend who has won multiple Emmys, Grammys, and even the prestigious Mark Twain Prize for comedy.  So who is this man you ask?  Looks like it's time for another edition of Who Dat Ninja?

This man is none other than the great Carl Reiner.  Carl Reiner began his career as an actor, playing the straight man to the crazy Sid Cesar on the 1950's variety show Your Show of Shows:

After Your Show of Shows ended, Reiner used his experience on the show to create the wildly successful Dick Van Dyke Show.  The show starred Dick Van Dyke (obviously) as Rob Pettrie, a comedy writer for a fictional variety show called The Alan Brady Show.  (Liz Lemon anyone?)  Carl Reiner not only created and wrote for the show, but also played the occasional role of the show's talent Alan Brady.  Here is a classic episode which features Carl Reiner as Alan Brady, where's Rob's wife Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) reveals to the world that Alan wears a toupee:

Carl Reiner also teamed with with comic filmmaker Mel Brooks (who wrote for Your Show of Shows) to create the classic "2,000 Year Old Man" comedy routine.  Reiner and Brooks used to improvise the routine backstage at Your Show of Shows, and then started performing it for friends at parties.  The routine became so successful, that they released 5 albums, the last of which won a Grammy Award for best comedy album.  In the routine, Reiner again played the straight man, interviewing Mel Brooks who claimed to be a man who was 2,000 years old.

Reiner has also had much success in film, writing and directing many films, many of which were for Steve Martin, such as Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid, The Man with Two Brains, and most famously, The Jerk.  He has acted in many films as well, most notably in the Oceans trilogy as Saul Bloom:

Carl Reiner is also the father of Rob Reiner, who starred on All in the Family and directed such classic films as The Princess Bride, This is Spinal Tap, and When Harry Met Sally... (Carl's wife, Estelle Reiner, delivered the famous "I'll have what she's having" line in the film).

And finally, here is Carl Reiner on Parks and Recreation!

And that's Carl Reiner, the guy who plays the President of Pawnee's Seniors United on Parks & Rec.  Today also happens to be Carl Reiner's 90th birthday, so Happy Birthday Carl!

Will Ferrell's Promotional Tour for Casa de mi Padre

This Friday, Will Ferrell has a new movie coming out called Casa de mi Padre.  The film is a spoof of traditional Mexican telenovelas, and features Will Ferrell speaking Spanish throughout the entire film.  As a huge fan of Will Ferrell, I am very excited to see this film.  And based on the commercials I've seen, it looks hilarious.  

Now when most actors have a film to promote, they appear on various talk shows to talk about the movie.  And usually they come out, tell a silly story, and answer the same old questions about the film on each show.  Will Ferrell however, is not like most actors. Over the last few days he has appeared on many talk shows to promote the film, and each appearance is vastly different.  And of course, hilarious.

First up, Will Ferrell appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live.  He arrived on a fake horse, and did the entire interview in Spanish.  

On The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Will Ferrell spent less than a minute talking about the film, and the rest of the time talking about his stylish "comedy helmet".

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Will's most "normal" interview was on the Today show with Matt Lauer:

Will appeared again on the Today show in the 4th hour to talk to Hoda and Kathy Lee.  This time, he was joined by co-star Nick Offerman (Ron Swanson from Parks & Recreation).  The two conducted the interview in robes will drinking Bloody Mary's.

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Lastly, while not a television appearance, Will Ferrell made a special video for his 3.5 million Facebook friends.  If you're not Facebook friends with Willl Ferrell, I suggest you become one, because you get to see the movie for free!  Check out the video here:

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Casa de me Padre arrives in theaters in just 2 days on Friday, March 16!

President Obama Calls Out Aziz Ansari

At a recent press conference, President Obama addressed many important issues facing our country, most notably, Aziz Ansari's lack of twitter followers.  He also informed the world that his daughter Malia is a big Parks & Recreation fan.  Check it out:

Happy Valentine's Day!

Still haven't made Valentine's Day plans?  Here are ideas from some of our favorite TV couples:

If you are your loved one are both working (preferably at the same job) and have a baby to take care of, you might consider avoiding the crazy Valentine's dinner "thing" and having to hire a baby sitter, and just going out for a nice romantic lunch.  Just remember that you still have to work after lunch, so try not to drink too much. Right Pam?

If you don't happen to work with your significant other, you can always surprise your loved one by sending flowers and chocolates at work. Just make sure you spell the name right so it doesn't go to the wrong person!

If you're willing it put in more effort than just sending flowers and chocolate, you can consider creating a scavenger hunt around the town, hiding clues in all of the places that are special to you two as a couple.

Or if you've been married for a while and you're tired of being those same old people you've been all year, you might want to try to spruce things up by pretending to be other people, going to a hotel bar, and seeing where the evening goes... (The commercial that plays before the clip is very long, but the clip will play once it's done)

Maybe you used to be with someone you really cared about, but recently had a fight and are now mortal enemies (for six months).  Valentine's Day is the perfect time to send that special someone a note to let them know how much you miss them.

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And if there is no special someone in your life right now, fear not.  You can always throw a "Lonely Hearts Valentines Single Mixer" in hopes of meeting that special someone.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Clip of the Day: NBC's Brotherhood of Men

Shortly before the Super Bowl began, I saw the following video posted online.  I had assumed it was a Super Bowl commercial, but I was disappointed that it never aired.  Nevertheless, I really enjoyed this.  There's nothing more entertaining to me than a big musical number filled with my favorite TV stars that span across multiple shows (see Jimmy Fallon's opening number from the 2010 Emmy Awards), and this video certainly succeeded in that.  The stars of 30 Rock, The Office, Parks & Recreation, Community, Saturday Night Live,  and pretty much every other NBC show all unite for this huge musical production of the song "Brotherhood of Man".  The song comes from the Broadway musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, which we just saw on Broadway a few weeks ago (starring Glee star Darren Criss), so it was even more fun for us since we knew the song.  The best part is at the very end...


And while not nearly as epic, here's another little NBC promo that we found online, but was sadly not shown during the Super Bowl (at least not where we live).  Classic.

Scrubs Interns & Flight of the Conchords

Hello faithful Blog Readers (do we have any faithful readers? do we have any readers at all? Is anyone even reading this?),

Remember when we said that this year our New Year's Resolution was to start watching new shows and blogging about them? Well, that hasn't happened yet. But it will ! It's still only February, so we got 10 months left to start watching a new show! I think we can do that.

As you've probably noticed, we've been incredibly busy lately, hence, we haven't written in a few weeks. But today, I found a short pocket of time (rather found an excuse to procrastinate doing work), so you are treated to a new blog entry!

If you've been watching the new season of Scrubs on ABC (which you should be watching, cause it's really good), then you have noticed that there are a new cast of interns who have joined The Sacred Heart who are working with our usual favorite group of doctors. Coincidentally, 2 of these new interns have also been featured on Flight of the Conchords! So we thought it would be fun to show a little side by side comparison of these up-and-coming character actors, as they're working their way through our favorite TV shows. Enjoy!

Eliza Coupe



Aziz Ansari


Aziz Ansari will also be starring on the new NBC Comedy from the creators of The Office called Parks and Recreation which stars Amy Poehler (Saturday Night Live) premiering April 9 at 8:30!