Hot in Cleveland was the highest rated show ever on TV Land. The premiere attracted 4.75 million viewers. I watched it and actually thought it was funny. I loved the fact that this was a show about three women friends who support each other. I loved the fact Wendy Malick is back on TV cause she is hysterical as an aging soap opera actress desperate to revive her career. Show also stars Jane Leeves from Frasier and Valerie Bertinelli. Betty White is billed as a special guest.
The show talks about what life is like for women as they approach 50 but more importantly it really makes fun of what LA and Hollywood does to women and with Malick playing an actress it gets to put in some zingers about how women are treated in the business.
The premise is that the friends are on their way to Paris and their plane has to make an emergency landing in Cleveland. They decide to get drunk and wind up in a bar where they are shocked that the men are actually looking at them. Valerie Bertinelli says “the men are actually looking at us. In LA they look past us.”
Other funny lines:
“The men look like real men and the women look like real women and everyone’s eating and no one’s ashamed.”
“We appear to have landed in a dimension where men hit on women their own age. We owe it to science to investigate.”
I loved the fact that the show makes fun on how unreal women — make that people — are in LA and what a nightmare it is to try and maintain that kind of existence. But the irony is as they are skewering the unrealistic LA lifestyle you can’t but help and notice that not one of these three 50-year-old actresses has a single line on her face. So they can make fun of the LA life but they can’t get cast of a show making fun of LA unless they look like they are botoxed up the wazoo. I want a show where not everyone looks like they have been botoxed within an inch of their life.
I also noticed that Lynda Obst is one of the executive producers. I’m going to keep watching.
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damn, I didn’t even know it was already on TV!! gotta DVR this next time :-D
I love L.A. and am so grateful for the industry that was born and raised here.
It’s heading out into the country now.
People do tend to be thinner here, there is way more plastic surgery, less than in Brazil. Here plastic surgery is for a specific purpose- to keep working, yet, the actresses with the most Oscar noms have not had surgery (that you can identify with the eye).
There are men with much more money here and in NY than in states like Ohio, so yes, they go with younger women. Donald Trump is NY, right?
I wonder if they will also poke fun at Ohio for having so many obese people eating themselves to death.
Ya’ can’t just hate on L.A.
take a poke at NY once in a while, and the states between the coast too
or it just gets
boring.
Thanks so much for this – wow – it is making me smile to think that Cleveland really is as real as it feels. I have always felt that way, part of why I decided to settle down here (old but true – it’s a great place to raise a family) after I came here for graduate school in the late 1980s. Might have to start watching Tv again – or on the web perhaps. ;)
Your blog and also on Jon Stewart’s show, where Betty White made an appearance, discussed the upcoming Hot in Cleveland show so I made a point of watching it, hoping it would be as interesting, funny and entertaining as promised.
Instead, full, front and center into the program about halfway, Valerie B.’s character enters the room in a Cleveland Indian’s t-shirt, with the reviled (yes, reviled!) Chief Wahoo, one of the remaining mascots that continues to depict native people in one of the most revolting, derogatory and insulting manners to date. There has been a continued fight for decades now to prohibit the use of just such mascots. In fact, the State of Wisconsin just signed a bill into law that will provide for a public process in reviewing the use of mascots in public schools; see more here: http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/national/94599204.html
This has not been an easy struggle for native people as racism and hatred runs deep against us in many areas. It is no small coincidence that this character appeared on this t-shirt the way it did. This was clearly an effort to build support for a team that chooses to ignore the pain and suffering it causes by continued use of this ridiculous character. In fact, if you would look closely at this mascot, it would need no explanation.
Surely someone who works so tirelessly to promote gender equality does not stop when it comes to ethnic equality? I simply cannot imagine that is the case. However, I am simply stumped as to why this blatant swipe at native people has been ignored to the point of a thundering silence as rave reviews such as the one you wrote have been sweeping this show to a success. I was cringing the entire time after I saw that shirt and could barely concentrate afterwards. I stopped laughing and waited for the show to end.
I have pondered thoughtfully on what to do next. I thought about writing to Ms. White; I couldn’t imagine she would support such an act if she knew the negative aspect of it and how it effected so many people.
You and I, and others, as professionals in the industry, know that costume and set design are integral parts of any production. Again, this was no accident, not by a long shot. I am simply appalled that actresses who I’ve always respected and admired would allow themselves to be caught up on the wrong side of such a contentious and emotional issue.
As you suggested, I am posting my comment on your blog. Hopefully, this will help get the word out to these actresses that to support such mascots is essentially blatant racism and apartheid-era behavior?
Thanks for the zingers about LA in your post. I was born and raised in Los Angeles (90032, baby) and my family had neither a car nor botox nor a mother neurotically obsessed with her looks. This blog is so often linked to I thought I might take it up, but with these sorts of inaccurate, negative soundbites on my town, what’s the point? Have you ever been to LA? You seem to have forgotten to leave Malibu and see the city of race riots, poor education, wonderful wonderful blatant immigration (no irony, Mexican and Central American immigrants in conjunction with Armenian, Persian, Irani, Philipino, Japanese and Korean ARE what and who makes LA a world class city), sweatshops, museums, food and theater. All of which seems to take place under the upturned noses who would visit LA and notice nothing but the BMW’s on the road and ignore the rest of us on the bus. PS I’m a bisexual woman of color, I went to a private high school and UCLA (under affirmative action) and have lived in Hollywood for years on my own dime, I don’t want a cookie just some notice from feminists because I live here, too. Please separate the industry from the City, there is so much more here and your post contributes to the ignorance.
That is a very legitimate point. I should not think that all of LA is like Hollywood. I think that maybe I should change the title to Hot in Cleveland Skewers Hollywood Life. And PS- I live in NYC.
oy Melissa, Hollywood is a place. It has a zip code.
People live there- maids, school teachers, construction workers, cops, nurses and barista’s work there.
If you have an issue with the film industry- say “film industry”
Be aware, there are a load more films being shot in NY right now
and New Orleans, Detroit, etc.
The industry has spread and most are welcoming the revenue.
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