Totally appropos of nothing, other than a viewing last night of
Special Victims Unit , I just wanted to share with readers my complete and utter hatred of
Law & Order: The Universe. I don't understand how this show is now on its 4th concurrent edition (
Trial by Jury) and has been running in some form or other for well over a dozen years.
For many of those years I successfully avoided
L&Obecause I just wasn't interested, as I've always felt that TV was very unimaginative in its series topics. It seems like there's a choice of three: hospitals, courtrooms, or police/detectives. I would often notice this show being on as I was flipping channels and each time my reaction was always... 'why does Jerry Orbach (RIP) waste his time with this when he could be doing a Broadway show?' or 'why does Dianne Wiest waste her time with this when she could be doing a movie?' followed by
'How many stations carry this freaking thing?'I finally saw some episodes last year when I had a houseguest who was a regular watcher of
L&O and I was alarmed to find that this show, which I had assumed to be a fairly good one given that it had nearly broken a consecutive Best Series Emmy nomination, was nothing more than
H&E "Headlines & Exposition" and then I began to get furious that the show is popular, prolific, award winning, and is now stealing one my favorite actors from Broadway (that'd be Bebe Neuwirth on the new
T&J) after having stolen one of my favorite actors from the silver screen (Wiest)
And all this even though it's possibly the stupidest and most predictable drama on television. And here's the really weird part: Smart people regularly watch it. So if you watch it don't feel like this is an attack on you ---some of my friends are regular viewers. But it's maddening to me in my more idealistic moments. You see, all episodes follow the
exact same arc. All plots are easy to follow. And even though they're easy, each scene will perform the exposition for you over again in case you are
really dense. No thought process will go on internally. All characters say everything there is to be said. They think out loud for you to follow along. In the show all criminals are easy to spot. And all criminals confess. And all crimes are solved by a certain time. And nothing ambiguous or personal ever happens. All bad guys go to jail. In comparison, scifi films and superhero flicks, often criticized for their lack of deep thinking are downright ambiguous when it comes to good vs. evil.
If you begin watching any episode at 8:02 and leave the television at 8:20 on any night, you could return to your TV 24 hours later the following night and be only SLIGHTLY confused (by the change in peripheral actors and storyline) and still be at the EXACT same point in the plot. And what's even worse? The creator is PROUD that it's a total formula from which the show will never veer (see his interview in
Entertainment Weekly)
Another thorn in my paw? For frequent obsessive theatergoers like myself, you can often spot abundantly talented singer/dancer/actors ranging from minimal to great Broadway fame typing away at a secretary's desk, answering phone calls, or spouting inane exposition for one minute as that scene's criminal/suspect/neighbor/family member of victim/family member of criminal/witness/victim/etc...
So in addition to being completely uninspired paint-by-numbers drama it's wasting precious talent in the most boring way you can ever use an actor: to deliver exposition. Nobody on the show delivers anything BUT exposition.
Now, my boyfriend reminds me that stage actors don't make any money (comparatively) and
Law & Order probably keeps theater careers alive with it's frequent paydays for Broadway babies. But that doesn't stop me from being haunted by the fact that Jerry Orbach did this show for more than a decade and now Bebe Neuwirth, one of Broadway's largest talents, won't have any time for Broadway any more since she's taking a lead role in this series. TV series aren't short hours for leads. And getting the summers off isn't enough time to headline a new Broadway show.
I like money too. I understand it from a financial perspective but the series creator is
also proud of the fact that you never learn anything about the regular characters' lives on the show. Now, I ask all actors out there: Why would any actor WANT to sign on for years of spouting exposition with no character arcs? Again people will scream "Money!" But surely someone else on the planet has offered Emmy (Frasier) and Tony (Chicago) winning BEBE f***ing NEUWIRTH a job where she actually has a character to play?
It's not just that I hate bad television and have a particular pet peeve with exposition-filled screenplays. It's also because I really and truly love Bebe Neuwirth. Everyone knows how hilarious she was on
Frasier of course. But on the stage she's true star wattage magic. I most recently saw her at the Zipper theater doing
"Here's Lies Jenny" and the entirety of her work on
Trial by Jury ,I can safely predict, will never measure up to one single song in that show.
Why, Bebe, why?
