TV Talk with Rob Owen category, Page 5
TV Talk: Confusion and celebrities highlight Super Bowl LIX ads
Some companies bought ads during Super Bowl LIX that failed to make clear the purpose of the product being advertised, essentially setting fire to an $8 million investment (the cost to buy a 30-second ad, not including millions of dollars in production costs). Overall, the ads were not memorable (or...
TV Talk: Prime Video cancels winning comedy ‘Pradeeps of Pittsburgh’
In typical late Friday, take-out-the-trash (e.g. bad news you don’t want too many people to see) fashion, Amazon’s Prime Video confirmed it canceled “The Pradeeps of Pittsburgh,” its entertaining-for-the-whole-family comedy about an Indian family that immigrates to Pittsburgh. Although filmed in Toronto, the series was created by veteran TV comedy...
TV Talk: ‘Sanford & Son’ reboot evolves into ‘Clean Slate’ on Prime Video
Prior to his December 2023 death, veteran TV comedy producer Norman Lear signed on to executive produce a series that fits his oeuvre of pro-social, anti-prejudice comedies, from “All in the Family” to “Maude” to both iterations of “One Day at a Time.” “Clean Slate,” now streaming eight episodes on...
TV Q&A: What happened to ‘Law & Order: Organized Crime’?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: The other two “Law & Order” shows have returned but not the Chris Meloni one, “Organized Crime.” How come? What happened to it? Is it...
TV Talk: 4 dogs from 2 Western Pa. rescues compete in ‘Puppy Bowl XXI’
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. Western Pennsylvania will be represented by four dogs from local two shelters in Animal Planet’s “Puppy Bowl XXI” (2 p.m. Feb. 9, Animal Planet, Discovery, TBS, truTV, Max and discovery+). For its 21st edition, the...
TV Talk: ‘Recruit’ returns; Michael Keaton’s ‘Goodrich;’ WTAE hires reporter
Netflix’s “The Recruit” is a poppier, more bubblegum spy show than Paramount+ with Showtime’s serious, dour and more authentic-seeming “The Agency.” But “The Recruit” is also more fun, a bit more of a lark that, profanity aside, could probably survive on a broadcast network. No wonder “The Recruit” comes from...
TV Q&A: Will Penguins games air this year on WTAE?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: I was wondering if you knew when the Penguins games will be on WTAE. I know they do a few every year on there. I...
TV Talk: ‘This Is Us’ creator follows NBC hit with Hulu thriller ‘Paradise’
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. “This Is Us” creator Dan Fogelman, who spent a portion of his childhood in Bethel Park, returns with his first new one-hour drama series since the partially Pittsburgh-set NBC drama ended in 2022. Hulu’s “Paradise,”...
TV Talk: How CBS’s ‘Watson’ recreates Pittsburgh in British Columbia
VANCOUVER, Canada — Turns out Pittsburgh is big enough for two TV medical dramas. Three weeks after streaming service Max debuted “The Pitt,” set at a fictionalized version of Allegheny General Hospital on the North Side, CBS premieres “Watson” (approximately 10 p.m. today following the AFC Championship game, KDKA-TV), a...
TV Talk: ‘Star Trek’ does ‘Suicide Squad;’ ‘Watson’ worth watching?
“Star Trek: Section 31,” a new movie streaming Friday on Paramount+, is pretty much the “Star Trek” version of “Suicide Squad” as a group of rogues team up to save the galaxy. Initially intended as a series, “Section 31” is set during the early seasons of “Star Trek: Discovery,” a...
Terminated employee sues WQED for age discrimination
Paula Zetter, a veteran Emmy-winning design director at WQED-TV who was among at least nine employees terminated by WQED CEO Jason Jedlinski in late 2023 and early 2024, filed an age discrimination lawsuit against the public broadcaster last week. According to court documents, Zetter seeks reinstatement to her job or...
TV Q&A: Will WQED-TV improve its signal?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: Any word on the possibility of WQED-TV improving its signal strength? Between their reduced signal, my antenna not doing the job, and no PBS app...
TV Talk: Pittsburgher absent from 4th season of ‘Joe Schmo’
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. Through its first three seasons — in 2003, 2004 and 2013 — there was always a Pittsburgher as the mark on “The Joe Schmo Show,” a faux reality competition where all the contestants are actors...
TV Talk: ‘Severance’ back after delay; Manganiello’s Steelers cakes
In the battle for viewers’ eyeballs, Apple TV+ remains a bit of a small fish in the large streaming pond, but Hollywood folks like to work for the service because Apple has more money to spend on shows than traditional Hollywood studios, although reports suggest even Apple is trying to...
TV Q&A: Did a KDKA-TV reporter switch stations?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: I was watching coverage of the Los Angeles fires on the CBS News website and saw KDKA-TV’s Barry Pintar in Los Angeles. He seemed to...
TV Talk: Pittsburgh native HGTV star loses home in L.A. fire
Pittsburgh native Leanne Ford, who starred with her brother Steve Ford for a few seasons on HGTV home makeover shows, posted to Instagram last week that less than a month after getting the keys to a new home in Los Angeles’ Rustic Canyon, the house was consumed by the Palisades...
TV Talk: Dick Wolf gets serialized with ‘On Call’
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. For executive producer Dick Wolf’s first scripted streaming series, “On Call” co-creators Tim Walsh (“Chicago P.D.,” “Hightown”) and Elliot Wolf (Dick Wolf’s son who was an executive producer on the unscripted series “Law & Order:...
TV Talk: Is ‘The Pitt’ — with all its local references — worth watching?
The first two episodes of streaming-only series “The Pitt” are available on Max (new episodes drop in subsequent weeks on Thursdays through April 10), and ultimately this Pittsburgh-set hospital drama proves to be fast-paced with well-developed doctors, med students and sometimes patient characters. It’s a grab-you-by-the-throat drama with each episode...
TV Talk: WPXI names new weekday evening anchor
As expected, WPXI announced morning anchor Gordon Loesch will succeed longtime Channel 11 anchor David Johnson, who retired last month. Loesch will anchor alongside Lisa Sylvester during the 5, 6 and 11 p.m. WPXI newscasts beginning Jan. 20. He’ll also co-anchor at 6:30 p.m. with Liz Kilmer and at 10...
TV Q&A: WPXI’s Cara Sapida shares her hair journey after cancer battle
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: I’m watching Channel 11, and Cara Sapida is doing her excellent reporting as usual. I know she wore a wig while she was going through...
TV Talk: Joe Manganiello previews ‘unbelievable’ season of ‘Deal or No Deal Island’
For his second season as host of NBC’s “Deal or No Deal Island” (8 tonight, WPXI), Mt. Lebanon native Joe Manganiello said the reality competition delivers in a way that’s can’t-miss TV. “You’re going to see something you’ve never seen before,” he said in a phone interview Christmas Eve afternoon....
TV Talk: ‘Shōgun,’ ‘Emilia Perez’ top winners at Golden Globes
Comedian Nikki Glaser, a stand-up comic best known as a mainstay on Comedy Central celebrity roasts, kicked off the 82nd annual Golden Globes telecast Sunday night in fine form, poking gentle but pointed fun at Hollywood celebrities and entertainment culture as movies “Emilia Perez” and “The Brutalist” and series “Shōgun,”...
TV Talk: Go on set to see how Pittsburgh-set ER drama ‘The Pitt’ gets made
BURBANK, Calif. — John Wells, a 1979 Carnegie Mellon University grad, watches on a monitor as he directs the last day of filming on the first episode of Pittsburgh-set Max medical drama “The Pitt.” It’s mid-July 2024 and production is just nine days into the 15-episode first season of a...
UPMC doctor shares her experiences with ‘The Pitt’ writers
Dr. Sylvia Owusu-Ansah, associate professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, was one of several doctors recruited by “The Pitt” writers/producers to offer perspective on what it’s like to be an ER physician in Pittsburgh and to share her experiences. During a two-hour...
TV Talk: Local queen competes on ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’
Nicholas Fry, 23, grew up in Greensburg, graduated from Hempfield Area High School in 2019, then studied film at Point Park University, graduating in 2023. Now he’s competing in Season 17 of “RuPaul’s Drag Race” as his drag alter ego, Lydia B. Kollins, for a cash prize of $200,000. “Drag...
