June 7, 2009
TV REVIEW: 'Royal Pains': Another Winner from USA
By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Editor
The motto of the USA Network is "Characters Wanted." The network's new "Royal Pains" series following "Burn Notice" at 10 p.m. ET Thursday evenings has characters aplenty and in my opinion is the best new USA series since "Burn Notice."
Mark Feuerstein ("The West Wing," "Good Morning Miami") plays Dr. Hank Lawson, who's been fired from his emergency room job with a prestigious New York City hospital. He's sulking in his apartment, having broken off with his fiancee and lost most of his furniture when his younger brother Evan (Paulo Costanza), an accountant, finally convinces Hank to accompany him on a weekend trip to the Hamptons on the eastern end of Long Island.
The pilot, which premiered Thursday, June 4, 2009, was directed by Jace Alexander, who helmed the pilot of "Burn Notice." Andrew Lenchewski did a fine job writing the pilot and Rich Frank and Paul Frank are the executive producers, with Lenchewski the co-executive producer and John Rogers producing.
(HNN "Dad's Point of View" columnist Bruce Sallan is a veteran Hollywood producer and he's promised some day to explain to me what all those producers really do. UPDATE: See the editor's note at the end of this column.)
Hank and Evan lie their way into a party at a mega-bucks mansion (the only kind in the Hamptons) where Hank saves the life of a woman who passes out. This leads to an offer from the mansion owner host (Campbell Scott) to be his concierge doctor. Hank is reluctant to take the position, which comes with a rent-free guest house, even though Evan thinks its a great idea, considering that Hank has been unfairly blacklisted in New York City because he saved the life of a pickup street basketball player allegedly at the expense of a billionaire hospital benefactor's life.
Jill Flint plays Jill Casey, who works at the local hospital and, by the end of the pilot episode, looks to become Dr. Hank's new love interest. Reshma Shetty plays Divya Sharma, who wants to be the physician assistant for the new "Hank Med" venture Evan has dreamed up. Evan is much more materialistic -- and realistic -- than Hank and wants to hang out with the rich and beautiful Hamptonites.
The pilot will be repeated throughout the week and the next episode of the 12-episode series will be aired Thursday, June 11, right after "Burn Notice." The cast is appealing, the writing is sparkling and the production values of the series that is actually filmed in the Hamptons rather than Vancouver, BC are outstanding. Bottom line: I'm predicting that "Royal Pains" will be a big hit for USA. Thursday night will be a great night of TV with both "Burn Notice" and "Royal Pains."
On a sad note, this will be the last season for one of my all-time favorite TV shows, USA's "Monk," starring Tony Shalhoub as the obsessive-compulsive San Francisco private eye Adrian Monk. The seventh and final season premieres July 18.
***
Editor's Note: Bruce Sallan e-mailed me this explanation of what producers do and get credit for:
In television, the "executive producer" is the senior producer. There are no guilds or regulations over who gets any producer credit in television. But, as a rule, the head writer will be the "show-runner" (e.g. executive producer) on a series. The producers will be a combination of lower level writers, and an actual producer who is sort of the general manager/contractor of the show and actually does the producing work. That means supervising the hiring of the crew, determining where you will shoot, monitoring and negotiating the budget, etc.
In TV movies, the executive producer has the senior position and makes all the choices from selling the idea originally, to developing the script with the writer up through all the pre production choices (locations, budget, director choice, and cast), production supervision, and ultimately post production. In my form, the TV movie, we actually we're usually in charge of the post production completely as the director often just provided a "first cut" and left to do another job. In TV series, the director rarely does even that and the Associate Producer is in charge of many aspects of post production while the writer/creator/executive producer should be supervising and being the creative vision of the editing and other post production processes (e.g. music).
In feature films, it is the producer who is boss, but often (also in TV), the actor, his manager, a writer, will demand and get a producer or executive producer credit though they will do NOTHING whatsoever that resembles producing. Also, in feature films, as in live theatre, the executive producer often has some connection to the money and nothing else (no creative input).
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TV REVIEW: 'Royal Pains': Another Winner from USA
By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Editor
The motto of the USA Network is "Characters Wanted." The network's new "Royal Pains" series following "Burn Notice" at 10 p.m. ET Thursday evenings has characters aplenty and in my opinion is the best new USA series since "Burn Notice."
Mark Feuerstein ("The West Wing," "Good Morning Miami") plays Dr. Hank Lawson, who's been fired from his emergency room job with a prestigious New York City hospital. He's sulking in his apartment, having broken off with his fiancee and lost most of his furniture when his younger brother Evan (Paulo Costanza), an accountant, finally convinces Hank to accompany him on a weekend trip to the Hamptons on the eastern end of Long Island.
The pilot, which premiered Thursday, June 4, 2009, was directed by Jace Alexander, who helmed the pilot of "Burn Notice." Andrew Lenchewski did a fine job writing the pilot and Rich Frank and Paul Frank are the executive producers, with Lenchewski the co-executive producer and John Rogers producing.
(HNN "Dad's Point of View" columnist Bruce Sallan is a veteran Hollywood producer and he's promised some day to explain to me what all those producers really do. UPDATE: See the editor's note at the end of this column.)
Hank and Evan lie their way into a party at a mega-bucks mansion (the only kind in the Hamptons) where Hank saves the life of a woman who passes out. This leads to an offer from the mansion owner host (Campbell Scott) to be his concierge doctor. Hank is reluctant to take the position, which comes with a rent-free guest house, even though Evan thinks its a great idea, considering that Hank has been unfairly blacklisted in New York City because he saved the life of a pickup street basketball player allegedly at the expense of a billionaire hospital benefactor's life.
Jill Flint plays Jill Casey, who works at the local hospital and, by the end of the pilot episode, looks to become Dr. Hank's new love interest. Reshma Shetty plays Divya Sharma, who wants to be the physician assistant for the new "Hank Med" venture Evan has dreamed up. Evan is much more materialistic -- and realistic -- than Hank and wants to hang out with the rich and beautiful Hamptonites.
The pilot will be repeated throughout the week and the next episode of the 12-episode series will be aired Thursday, June 11, right after "Burn Notice." The cast is appealing, the writing is sparkling and the production values of the series that is actually filmed in the Hamptons rather than Vancouver, BC are outstanding. Bottom line: I'm predicting that "Royal Pains" will be a big hit for USA. Thursday night will be a great night of TV with both "Burn Notice" and "Royal Pains."
On a sad note, this will be the last season for one of my all-time favorite TV shows, USA's "Monk," starring Tony Shalhoub as the obsessive-compulsive San Francisco private eye Adrian Monk. The seventh and final season premieres July 18.
***
Editor's Note: Bruce Sallan e-mailed me this explanation of what producers do and get credit for:
In television, the "executive producer" is the senior producer. There are no guilds or regulations over who gets any producer credit in television. But, as a rule, the head writer will be the "show-runner" (e.g. executive producer) on a series. The producers will be a combination of lower level writers, and an actual producer who is sort of the general manager/contractor of the show and actually does the producing work. That means supervising the hiring of the crew, determining where you will shoot, monitoring and negotiating the budget, etc.
In TV movies, the executive producer has the senior position and makes all the choices from selling the idea originally, to developing the script with the writer up through all the pre production choices (locations, budget, director choice, and cast), production supervision, and ultimately post production. In my form, the TV movie, we actually we're usually in charge of the post production completely as the director often just provided a "first cut" and left to do another job. In TV series, the director rarely does even that and the Associate Producer is in charge of many aspects of post production while the writer/creator/executive producer should be supervising and being the creative vision of the editing and other post production processes (e.g. music).
In feature films, it is the producer who is boss, but often (also in TV), the actor, his manager, a writer, will demand and get a producer or executive producer credit though they will do NOTHING whatsoever that resembles producing. Also, in feature films, as in live theatre, the executive producer often has some connection to the money and nothing else (no creative input).
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Make HNN Your Homepage (IE Users Only)
