The Post’s TV/Radio columnist since 1982, Phil Mushnick joined the newspaper in 1973. He’s covered the Nets, Rangers and New York Cosmos.
At a time when TV news folks are being laid off by the dozens, it becomes extra painful to see how local newscasts waste money. Recently, the 11 p.m. edition of Ch. 7’s “Eyewitness News” reported Larry King’s planned...
July 18, 2010 2:59 AM
What’s left of NBC News, now relegated to serve NBC’s promotions department, is both laughable and frightening. This past Monday morning, NBC’s “Today” and NBC reporter Jeff Rossen, in an “exclusive report,” tried to...
July 03, 2010 11:32 PM
Hey, like ya know, it’s the news, like, ya know? In 2003, an internal CNN memo was leaked to the outside: CNN anchors were urged to use hipper, hopper expressions to lure younger viewers to newscasts. The embarrassing...
June 26, 2010 10:53 PMThis year’s Tony Awards show didn’t make much day-after noise or news. Why? By my estimation (pure guesswork) last Sunday’s edition on CBS featured at least 75 percent less cleavage than any recent Academy Awards or...
June 19, 2010 7:56 PM
It doesn’t matter how well-intentioned and noble you are at the start. No TV show is allowed to stay up there. Sooner or later, TV will either force it down here, or throw it over there — in the cancelled bin. America...
June 13, 2010 3:47 AM
Among, say, 1,000 college graduates, how many would legitimately forget what they majored in? How many honestly would claim to have a degree in biology when their degree’s in English, or state that they majored in...
May 30, 2010 3:27 AMWhether it’s swinging a baseball bat, a tennis racket or a golf club, the self-evident secret to a good swing is a smooth, full, natural follow through. Anything less can be extremely ineffective, even counterproductive...
May 22, 2010 11:03 PMUnfortunately — and understandably — nothing makes for more farce-filled live TV than breaking news. The scramble to hold an audience while appearing to be on top of things makes for some regrettable, unforgettable...
May 16, 2010 3:56 AMSign of the Times: Betty Lou Lynn, 83 — who played Thelma Lou on the old “Andy Griffith Show” — moved to Mount Airy, NC after the third time she was mugged in LA. Mount Airy was the town depicted as bucolic Mayberry on...
May 09, 2010 2:57 AMBased on when they appear, their numbers and their staying power, Judge shows — real but made-for-TV, civil-suit courtroom television — are America’s most in-demand weekday TV. In New York, for example, eight judge...
May 02, 2010 4:24 AMFor years we were told that if we ever knew how a hot dog is made, and if we ever knew the precise ingredients within, we’d be sickened by the mere thought, then avoid hot dogs for ever and ever, if not longer. The...
April 25, 2010 1:19 AMLast Saturday afternoon, as the third round of the Masters golf tournament was played on CBS, a story of colossal international tragedy was breaking: An airliner, carrying a large contingent of Polish government and...
April 17, 2010 11:43 PMAlong with “Anything worth doing is worth over-doing” and “No bad idea is unworthy of duplication,” another don’t-bet-against-it TV expectation has arisen: On commercial TV, anything reliable, practical and useful can...
April 11, 2010 12:38 AMAs a kid-embracing TV network, Nickelodeon has moved in a very predictable direction: Low, lower and keep going. Last night’s annual “Kids’ Choice Awards” included some interesting choices, especially for kids. For...
March 28, 2010 1:44 AMThe History Channel lately has shown “The World At War,” the superb, 26-part, British-made 1973 documentary about World War II. One of its essential themes — and a theme of most credible histories of the 20th Century —...
March 21, 2010 1:13 AMProgress! (Perhaps.) Last year at this time, with a prompt from reader Jim Mulloy, this column noted that the History Channel’s salute to St. Patrick’s Day was, for the most part, nothing better than a cheap and...
March 13, 2010 11:54 PMIt must be the latest ritual in TV news rooms: Walk in, hang up your coat and hat in one closet, hang your dignity and credibility in the other. On the morning after the Olympics more than two consecutive weeks of NBC...
March 07, 2010 2:04 AMSince 1988, when the International Olympic Committee first allowed NBC to do whatever it pleases to the Olympics (hey, the money was right), the Games have been predicated on one formula: American audiences are too...
February 28, 2010 12:59 AMWhat’s worse for a big-time network newsman: Being stuck in the wrong place at the wrong time by accident or being stuck in such a place on orders from your network? Seven years ago, CNN anchor Aaron Brown took a...
February 21, 2010 1:23 AM
Sometimes new-age sensitivities and modern human relations seem short on those very two things — sensitivity and humanity. Take, for example, that show that recently was all over ABC, “Sanfords and Sons.” Jenny...
February 14, 2010 12:04 AMThe most surprising thing about the angry fallout from MTV’s “Jersey Shore” is the anger and surprise. It’s MTV. What do folks think MTV is, a music video network? Hasn’t been in 15 years. Do people think it’s a TV...
February 07, 2010 1:15 AMHow did the pursuit of equality become joined with an enemy of equality, the double standard, the kind regularly seen and fed by and on TV? Try this one on: When I see Mel Gibson on TV my blood runs angry. Although we...
January 31, 2010 1:13 AMThe best comedy on cable? No contest. The daily cable news shows. Turn on one — any one of them — sit back, wait 30 to 60 seconds and enjoy! Last week, CNBC reported that government funding of “affordable housing” is...
January 24, 2010 3:34 AMWhen will it end? Where will it end? Can TV ever return to targeting viewers’ intellects instead of their crotches? Sunday used to be a day when even TV’s biggest, boldest slobs took it easy. Sunday was allowed to be a...
January 16, 2010 11:37 PMFor all the garbage on TV and radio, perhaps no garbage is more distressing than the low-brow acts now enacted by those we’re supposed to recognize as both political sophisticates and adults. Commentators on the far...
January 10, 2010 12:15 AMIn 1968, when I was in high school, 42nd Street wasn’t a particularly nice strip. Hell, it was Sleaze Street. But that’s where this new movie, “The Odd Couple” was playing. Originally a Broadway play, it didn’t debut as...
December 20, 2009 12:40 AMWanna know why this is still the greatest country in the world? Glad you asked. Beginning Nov. 30, the day before President Obama delivered his “War in Afghanistan” strategy speech at West Point, nearly every mass media...
December 13, 2009 6:07 AMNever has a once-vibrant and significant TV network died a more noiseless, anonymous death than did 18-year-old CourtTV last month. The remaining 65 or so employees of what’s now truTV had their exit interviews at...
December 06, 2009 2:06 AMIt’s hardly news that weekday “Judge” shows are reliant on the dimwitted — as plaintiffs, defendants and viewers. But an installment of “Judge Joe Brown,” seen here on Fox 5 last week, seemed unusually exploitive of a...
November 29, 2009 1:40 AMRemember debating class? Do high schools still have debating classes, debating teams? The debating class teacher often would find two students on opposite sides of an issue then assign them each other’s position to...
November 22, 2009 1:39 AM
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