SHAMELESS PLUG

So the scuttlebutt around Hollywood these days is that "Studio 60: Live on the Sunset Strip" is on the verge of being cancelled.

This might be the stupidest thing that NBC-Universal has done (next to deciding not to have expense programing in the 8pm hour) since GE combined the two companies and they lost Stacy Snider as the head of universal.

TV has been outstanding as entertainment, surpassing movies because movies became "product" whereas TV is all about selling product... and Sorkin's incisive wit and commentary on what's hip for pop culture beyond the Paris/Brittany set. Sure the show is about what goes on at someplace that people don't get or maybe wanna get, but the pressures of creating the material that entertains the general audience is indeed compelling drama. The battle between art and commerce probably doesn't mean SHIT to 95% of the viewing audience, but they love it when art edges out business just for a second and engaging material is the result (whether it's TV, books, movies, theater or music). And obivously it's not The Office, which is perhaps the most familiar TV known to have been conceived, but not everyone can make light of the world of the Wage Slave that far too many of us suffer(ed) under.

People love to read biographies of famous people who bucked the odds, but those people are usually famous from doing something in the realm of "art" (i.e. Coco Chanel, Liz Taylor, Picasso, Jennifer Aniston), not bold-faced commerce and Sorkin's examination of the trials and tribulations of "putting it together" is pulls back the curtain to a certain extent. However, not as shameless as any "making of" supplement on the most recent of DVDs.

True, the in-show comedy sketches need to be better (i.e. hire some writers strictly for that purpose alone), but the human condition plumbed on Monday nights at 10pm is worth more people watching. So get out the Vote, and set your Nielson boxes or deluge NBC's email box with "keep this show" spam bombs. Whatever it takes. Sorkin is worth it -- I don't know how many people adored the West Wing, but I doubt it was the same huge number of fans by the end of the first season as it was at the beginning.