Seminar Lisa Schwarzbaum

 

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The classroom setting in Seminar, Theresa Rebeck's glibly synthetic, audience-stroking comedy about creativity and its discontents, is a spacious living room in the kind of sprawling, rent-controlled, jealousy-inducing Upper West Side apartment that audiences will congratulate themselves for having seen in a thousand New Yorker cartoons. The teacher, Leonard (Alan Rickman), a faded Famous Author hired to provide private writing lessons to four ambitious students paying $5,000 for the privilege, is the kind of amusingly embittered, parrying, preening, bon mot-dropping middle-aged intellectual a--hole that audiences will, likewise, be flattered to recognize from a thousand Broadway and Off Broadway plays. (Try Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage and Art, for starters.)
The four students are also types recognizable from New Yorker cartoons and Off-Broadway plays. And NBC sitcoms too. There's the well-connected, entitled Douglas (Jerry O’Connell), the sexually aggressive Issy (Hetienne Park), the insecure, eating-ice-cream-out-of-a-tub Kate (Lily Rabe), and Martin, the angry one with a load of chips on his shoulder (Hamish Linklater). Rebeck moves her five characters around as the students compete for approval and advancement in combinations as over-determined as they are arbitrary. Meanwhile, aphorisms and clever put-downs fly. Someone is ''relentlessly talent-free.'' Someone else, whose work is deemed hollow, ''should think about Hollywood.'' Names are dropped: Tobias Wolff, Frank Conroy, the artists' colonies Yaddo and MacDowell. There's not one moment of risk.
Seminar has little of depth or authenticity to say about the struggle to put words in an order that says something true. But it does have Alan Rickman reigning over the production with his distinctive voice and imperious visage. No one delivers verbal abuse with more panache. Indeed, Seminar is almost too easy a gig for the star who, in the cramped staging of director Sam Gold (Circle Mirror Transformation) does a lot of entering, heaping plummily accented abuse in the name of brutal honesty, and then exiting the scene. Everyone moves around the stage a lot in an imitation of forward motion.
As for the other four other performances, each reflects the limitations imposed by the playwright. Park and O'Connell get the worst of the bargain since (to use a word lambasted early in the dialogue) there is no ''interiority'' to either Izzy or Douglas. The distinctive Rabe (an outstanding Portia opposite Al Pacino in The Merchant of Venice last season), is impressively resourceful in filling out the personality of a young woman oddly designated by the playwright as alternately a princess (the apartment belongs to her family), a feminist, a sexually frustrated Bridget Jones type, a bad writer, and a good one. (In the final scene she's someone else entirely — although who, exactly, is impossible to figure out.)
If, in the end, Seminar belongs to Hamish Linklater, it's not only because the actor does such a good job of creating, sustaining, and quietly intensifying Martin's full personality, building to the play's one honest dramatic climax. It's also because Rebeck has taken the care to make Martin a person, not a just a plot piece. Leonard would have something barbed to say about him — and then approve. C+

Breaking from rehearsals for their final performances, Ricki Lake, Rob Kardashian and J.R. Martinez reveal what shocked them most about their time on the show.

ABC

Before the Dancing With the Stars class of season 13 graduates on Tuesday, the remaining competitors are taking a look back on their exhausting three months working on the show.

ABC's weekly call to the series' Twitter followers prompted one user to ask what's surprised them most about their time on the show. north face outlet Ricki Lake, Rob Kardashian and J.R. Martinez reacted accordingly.

Some answers don't come as much of a surprise -- Rob is still reeling from making it all the way to week 10 -- while others offer some insight into the psyche of a celebrity reinvigorated by their time on the show.
PHOTOS: 'Dancing With the Stars' Season 13 Cast Official Photos
"I'm a pretty strong woman," says Ricki, who just solidified plans for another talk show. "I'm doing things I never thought I could do before. I think I've grown and come into my own at a time in my life where I never thought I'd be peaking... So 43 has been a really good year for me."
See everything the final three have to say in this exclusive video shot during their last rehearsals:

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Netflix Takes Content Cue From Cable

Everett Collection

The cast of 'Arrested Development,' portraying the Bluth family. Netflix plans to revive the series, but the number of new episodes hasn't been set.

Netflix Inc.'s plan to resurrect the cult television comedy "Arrested Development" highlights the way the DVD and video-streaming service is increasingly mirroring the programming mix on cable-TV channels, with a blend of reruns and original shows.

Netflix said late Friday that it struck a deal with studio Twentieth Century Fox Television and production company Imagine Television to be the sole U.S. outlet for the revived series, which is slated to return in 2013.
"Arrested Development," about the dysfunctional Bluth family, attracted rave reviews and a fervent fan base, but not one big enough to save it from cancellation in 2006, after three seasons.
The accord envisions bringing the show back for roughly 10 episodes, said a person familiar with the matter, though the cast and exact length of the run have yet to be worked out. Deals to bring back cast members haven't been completed, and the run could be longer or shorter than 10 episodes, this person said.
The plan could be risky for Netflix. While it isn't unheard of for a channel or platform to pick up a show that has been canceled, the return of a live-action series that has been off the air so long is "highly unusual," said TV historian Tim Brooks.

Netflix declined to comment on terms of the deal, or on anything about the production. Both Twentieth Century Fox Television, and Fox Broadcasting, which aired the original show, are units of News Corp., which owns The Wall Street Journal.

The deal reflects Netflix's continuing effort to improve the array of programming on its streaming-video service, which still offers mostly old movies and TV shows. It isn't the first time Netflix has commissioned an original series. The company said earlier this year that it will air 26 episodes of "House of Cards," a new drama featuring Kevin Spacey, starting in late 2012. It also has explored other potential deals for original shows, according to media executives.
The programming at most cable channels evolved in much the same way. The channels started with movies and reruns of TV series and then began commissioning original series.
"Our content-acquisition strategy is unchanged over the past few years: Add a broad range of movies and TV shows to the catalog for our members to watch instantly streaming from Netflix," said Netflix spokesman Steve Swasey. "That includes licensing original content."

The return of "Arrested Development" also shows how Netflix and its on-demand subscription service are funneling new revenue to shows that sometimes have limited appeal in reruns or syndication. Those programs include series whose plots follow closely from one episode to the next, such as the 1960s drama "Mad Men," which Netflix licensed from Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. earlier this year.

Reruns of such shows typically fetch less money from cable channels and local TV stations in syndication because they are difficult to watch out of order. But Netflix pays handsomely for them because its users like watching one episode after another on the service, media executives say, and that is changing studios' calculus.
"Arrested Development" has a similarly continuous narrative structure. Some jokes set up in one episode don't pay off until later episodes.
How much Netflix will pay for the show is unclear, but producers had been seeking as much as $3 million per episode, people familiar with the situation said.
There have been efforts to save "Arrested Development" since its cancellation, with talk of a movie surfacing repeatedly in intervening years. Recently, the producers behind the series, including creator Mitch Hurwitz, began pitching a limited run of new episodes leading up to a movie, according to a person familiar with the discussions.
Netflix's disclosure of the deal follows a months-long rough patch for the company. Customers rebelled after Netflix raised prices for a popular service by 60% in July, and then announced a since-aborted plan to spin off its DVD-rental-by-mail into a business called Qwikster in September.
The "Arrested Development" deal should provide a minor boost to Netflix, said Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter, but it won't make up for the shows it will lose when its streaming deal with pay-TV channel Starz expires early next year.
So far, however, fans appear happy about the deal. Some took to Twitter to say "Great news!" and " the north face WOOOOOOOOO!"
—Lauren A.E. Schuker contributed to this article

The singer works that NC-17 territory, but the sauciness sometimes borders on shtick. With an eye toward Middle America, it's mostly just insinuation.

Were she willing to tip her hand a little earlier, NFL Camo Rihanna might have considered kicking off her new album, "Talk That Talk," with "Watch n' Learn," which appears near the end of the 11-song release and best captures the Barbados-born singer's most prominent obsession. On it, Rihanna, who over the last half-decade has risen to become one of the most successful pop artists in the world, outlines the myriad ways in which she'll have her NFL Jerseys way with a lover.

On the bed, on the couch, on the floor, till you're making faces, till you can't take it no more, slow, until her lipstick ain't up on her face no more. Rihanna reels off her carnal intentions with an impressive though not entirely believable candor.



The 23-year-old star, who's been gliding toward the edges of pop propriety since her first hit in 2005, has progressively pushed toward NC-17 territory, moving from the insinuation of "Umbrella" to the naughtier "Hard" and the Caribbean-flavored murder ballad "Man Down," from 2010's "Loud." The parental warning stickers have done wonders for her career, but the sauciness sometimes borders on shtick.

That said, "Talk That Talk" Cheap Jerseys is not entirely sex-obsessed. For balance's sake, and because she's making music in the pop realm and beholden to relatively conservative mores, Rihanna on "Talk That Talk" also harnesses her producers and songwriters -- including Dr. Luke, StarGate, Alex Da Kid, The-Dream and others -- to focus love above the waist and how passion affects both the body and the mind. Throughout, she plays on the idea that we all want the same thing out of life -- to be "drunk on love" (as she sings in a song of the same name).

She eases into her bed over the course of the album, first with a loving confession -- "You Da One," a Dr. Luke-produced jam with a hint of Jamaican roots reggae and a punchy synthetic rhythm -- then with wandering desire and heartbroken regret. There are odes to bad love -- "We Found Love" -- and universal love -- "We All Want Love." "Drunk on Love," which samples the slow-burn melody of the XX's "Intro," finds Rihanna confessing that love is the only thing she needs.

She delivers her sentiments inside a pan-American pop sound with a hint of the long musical conversation between the Caribbean and Americas. It's a stylistic accent that she's carried with her from Barbados, though she employs it with her collaborators enough to suggest her linage without alienating Middle America. She can slip into a convincing patois when so inclined but seldom does so on "Talk That Talk."

Rather, Rihanna wants her music to bang, and she does so by continuing to mine the connection between R&B, hip-hop and house. A few of these tracks, most obviously "We Found Love," her collaboration with British producer Calvin Harris, and "Where Have You Been," wouldn't be out of place at Electric Daisy Carnival.

Even the slower songs feature double-snare riddims that suggest energy, even when paced down; overall, the bass is heavier, the sounds are nastier, and by the second half of the record, Rihanna's intentions are decidedly, unapologetically .... hornier. Call it Technotronic on steroids, Lady Gaga on Viagra, Millie Jackson on ecstasy: These are pumped-up hits aimed at the pelvic region.

But ultimately, Rihanna's making only superficially dangerous music. Without the visual prompting of her music videos, even the bawdiest lyrics are kept within the realm of average American propriety. Yes, there's some breast and booty, but Bo Carter was way raunchier in the 1930s with "It's Done Got Wet" and "Pin in Your Cushion" than Rihanna is in 2011 with "Cockiness (Love It)" and "Birthday Cake," both of which feature lyrics that wouldn't seem out of place on Spinal Tap's "Smell the Glove." ("… cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake/ I know you wanna bite this.")

For all the innuendo and introspection, "Talk That Talk" contains little sweat, slobber or fluids and a lot of plasticized, inflatable insinuation. (Recall her song "S&M," which name-checked whips and chains without ever having to use the words sadism or masochism.)

The hottest lines on the album come nearly as an afterthought on the all-too-brief "Birthday Cake," produced by The-Dream. "I know you wanna bite this/ It's so enticin'/ Nothin' else like this/ I'mma make you my bitch," she sings. But as if the network censors had let the song run before realizing their mistake, a little over a minute into it the music fades out, just as it's getting dirty, leaving us wondering whether Rihanna really believes what she's selling on "Talk That Talk." Rihanna"Talk That Talk"
Def Jam
Two stars (Out of four)
-- Randall Roberts

Justin Bieber dons yellow zebra pants, shuffles on stage with LMFAO at the AMAs: Watch it here!

Image Credit: Jeff Kravitz/AMA 2011/FilmMagic
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After a night of electro-fizzy, TRON-imitating, backing track-assisted performances, LMFAO appropriately closed the 2011 American Music Awards (Check out the winners!) with a thumping medley of “Party Rock Anthem” and “Sexy And I Know It.”

The afro’d duo provided all the typical pop tropes people have come to expect at an awards show like this. You know, giant robot heads, laser beams shooting from the ceiling, glittery bras, and an entire crowd of people wearing 3-D glasses — the stuff music is really about, at least according to the AMAs.
One thing most performance don’t have, though? A dancing cameo by pop culture’s favorite 5’3″ teen sensation: Justin Bieber.
Wearing a yellow pair of LMFAO’s trademark Zubaz pants, Bieber hopped into the middle of the rowdy dance circle and shuffled out a chorus to “Party Rock Anthem” while wearing a sleeveless black shirt with the word “SEXY” emblazoned across the chest. Check out the finale performance below (Bieber appears around the 2:45 mark):