May is upon us, the last sweeps extravaganza before TV's summer hiatus. All the major series are winding down, or in the case of NBC's Will & Grace, the show that brought queers into more American households than anyone would ever have thought possible, winding to a close. The final two episodes air May 4 & 11. Watch, weep and remember how funny W&G was when it debuted, how terrific it was to see gay inside-jokes every week on primetime network TV, and how W&G paved the way for the popularity of Queer Eye and other blatantly gay programming and characters.
Even though W&G has only been mildly amusing for the past few seasons and far too much attention has been focused on Grace's messy hetero personal life, the show will always hold a place in our hearts for the many nights it made us laugh out loud to queer in-jokes, making straight America the outsider, and us, finally, the insiders.
They say when one door shuts, a window opens. That window would be on The View. The worst-kept secret in Hollywood was revealed at the Daytime Emmy Awards on April 28 when Rosie O'Donnell did a pretend confrontation with Barbara Walters over whether Rosie would be replacing Meredith Vieira in the catty morning round-up. Walters "revealed" that O'Donnell would join The View in September when the musical chairs begin.
The Emmy cam panned to Ellen DeGeneres, who immediately sported the kind of sickly smile that goes with getting a pie in the face. Will there be room for two lesbian comedians on daytime TV?
The Rosie reveal caused Jimmy Kimmel to opine later on his show that "Rosie O'Donnell will be replacing Meredith Vieira, who will be replacing Katie Couric, who will be replacing Bob Schieffer, who replaced Dan Rather, who replaced Walter Cronkite, who will be replacing Rosie O'Donnell on the lesbian cruise-ship circuit."
See what W&G spawned?
Kimmel, who regularly lambastes The View 's most irritating member, Star Jones, referring to the well-documented feud between Jones and O'Donnell, said, "It will be like wrestling every day if it were for real." (Earlier in the week, when the rumor was still rumor, Kimmel had proclaimed, "If Rosie O'Donnell replaces Meredith Vieira on The View, she and Star Jones, that's like Alien vs. Predator .")
Personally, we are looking forward to seeing Rosie back on daytime, and anything that puts Jones' perky little nose job out of joint is just icing for us. Since Rosie, mother of five, will fill the "Mom" spot left by Vieira, we expect to hear a great deal about her children and wife in the daily chat segment of the show. That should slap the morning audience around just a little bit and get the homophobes complaining to the sponsors.
Speaking of homophobes, in case you were wondering, Rev. Jerry Falwell still hates queers. Or so he told Nightline anchor Terry Moran in a creepy interview on April 27.
When Moran queried whether lesbians and gay men might feel his comments that gays and lesbians shouldn't exist were "genocidal," Falwell never demurred. You can't fault him on consistency.
Moran addressed the courting of Falwell by perennial Presidential hopeful John McCain. Where once McCain was clear that Falwell was an agent of intolerance, now he is wooing Falwell's endorsement. Falwell has yet to make a decision, proving that tossing your integrity out the window for an endorsement isn't always the wisest move.
The discussion of McCain led Moran to the gay questions because, at least until it becomes politically expedient to change his mind, McCain opposes a Constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, while Falwell not only supports the idea, he's making every effort to facilitate it.
Falwell told Moran that ex-gays were the most reviled and oppressed people in America today. "Not homosexuals?" Moran asked with appropriate incredulity. "No." Falwell was firm: the ex-gays are the nation's targets.
Pravda west
In another parallel universe, the White House, George Bush made it official: Fox is the spokes-network for the Bush Administration.
We couldn't help but feel a little twinge of sadness for hard-working Scott McClellan after he was unceremoniously axed (oops, sorry, like Andy Card, he "resigned") and replaced a nanosecond later by the soigné Tony Snow, the most right-wing pundit on Fox News. There's dumpy little McClellan, who has lied spectacularly for his ubermenschen for lo these many grisly years, smiling sickly into the face of the Come-Alive Ken doll, Snow, who looked more Presidential standing at the podium than our fearless leader.
At the podium, Bush was joking in his Henny Youngman way that Snow had criticized him but had then said, "You should have heard what I said about the other guy!" Ha, ha.
Well, Snow might have criticized Bush once upon a Midnight dreary as he pondered weak and weary about why Bush wasn't more of a Fascist, but those days are clearly over. We're not sure what script the Snow replacement is following, but it's like Hitler ditching Goebbels for Leni Riefenstahl. The Bushstag clearly needed a prettier face fielding those nasty questions than the little closet case who did his evil duty for the past few years, with only Jeff Gannon to show for his efforts.
Meanwhile, over in the reality sector, Oprah continues to try and run the country the way it should be run: by paying attention. We have forgiven Oprah for the James Frey debacle and even for the dress she was wearing April 28. (We've never seen a grown woman with enormous breasts (who wasn't dressing up for some weird trick) wear a black dress with a flounce skirt, a blazing white Peter Pan collar and matching French cuffs. It made her look like some weird black Annie, or black Wednesday from the Addams Family.
We have forgiven Oprah because she has gone back to socially relevant programming. It often seems that Oprah is doing more for Americans and others in crisis than the President. Scratch "seems."
This week, the most powerful woman in America explored the class biases of America, and how they influence poverty and the widening income gap under Bush. The rich are getting richer, it's not your imagination. Under Bush, the income gap has widened so dramatically that 1% of Americans hold 40% of the wealth. The middle class is evaporating, and there is a greater gap between rich and poor than ever in US history.
Oprah also had George Clooney, whose latest mission is ending the genocide in Darfur, talk about his trip there and what he learned about the genocide. In the midst of all this darkness, there is still hope. Hope because Oprah is still there to alert us to injustices, even as the government refuses to do anything to avert or mitigate them.
School lessons
Also this week, Nightline profiled Kayla Brown, 24, an elementary school teacher in Texas who came to the startling conclusion that her elementary school children were failing because the kids were hungry.
Brown spoke to her church and organized a food drive to help them long-term. One of the stats to come out in the Nightline segment: the percentage of people going to food banks in desperate need has gone up 18% this year.
Pres. Bush said on a visit to New Orleans on April 27 that the government was ready for another hurricane at the same time Sen. Susan Collins (a Republican) was giving a press conference declaring that FEMA was utterly useless and incapable. Uh, Mr. President, isn't FEMA who you call for hurricane relief? And we are ready how?
Someone must have mixed up his cue cards. Again.
Finally our quote of the week comes from Tony Snow in a 2003 segment of Fox News Sunday: "Here's the unmentionable secret: Racism isn't that big a deal any more. No sensible person supports it. Nobody of importance preaches it. It's rapidly becoming an ugly memory."
Obviously, Snow lives in the same parallel universe as the rest of the Bush Administration. Much as we would like Snow's comments to be accurate, racism is very much a big deal. Only white people seem to think otherwise.
Think racism doesn't matter? Take a look at the Duke rape controversy. Racism matters.
So watch for a summer of neat new spin from the White House's newest spin doc. And practice "Springtime for Hitler." Stay tuned.