Call me cranky, call me a codger, but sometimes it's hard to keep up with the alleged trends and the claptrap buzzwords used to describe them. Let alone keep up with the shows.
Principally, today I refer to the unfortunate term "hate-watch." For a couple of years now, persons writing about TV for all those desperate-to-be-hipster online outfits are obliged to blather about shows that are "hate-watched." Apparently, for instance, Aaron Sorkin's The Newsroom on HBO is a show to hate-watch.
Well, to use a word not favoured by desperate-to-be-hipster online outfits, this is hooey. The Newsroom isn't very good. Watching it in order to make lame sarcastic remarks on Twitter is something you do if you don't, in fact, have a clue about anything.
Peter Pan Live! (NBC, CITY-TV, Thursday, 8 p.m.) is the big deal tonight. And in general it's a big deal for a U.S. network TV. Thing is, look up the advance coverage and you will find copious material about it being a "hate-watch" event. Snigger, snigger, sneer, sneer.
According to The Daily Beast, "Allison Williams, Christopher Walken and the cast of Peter Pan Live! talk about bracing themselves for hate-tweets." And according to the online version of Entertainment Weekly, "Twitter's been waiting its whole life for this. To help save precious seconds, here are some pre-written tweets you can draft ahead of time: 'More like Christopher DANCEN!'"
You get the picture – the whole point of doing a Broadway show live on TV is to allow a bunch of people to make dumb comments on Twitter. And in terms of advance coverage, that is what is known as asinine.
The context here is the success of last year's live broadcast of The Sound of Music. About 23 million people watched it live. Some made jokes about it on Twitter. Not 23 million people, just a few thousand wannabe comedians who, of course, hated it. Because theatre and musicals are stupid, presumably, from the vantage point of hipster trolls with a Twitter account.
My point, and I do have another one coming, is this – a bunch of people should save their hate for something worth loathing. Like, say, hunger, racism, sexism, the murder of innocents and the glorification of the loathsome. The list doesn't include theatre and musicals.
Peter Pan Live! matters in many ways. It's like this, you see – sometimes, staying in and watching great TV is what you do. Besides, it's bloody cold outside right now. And then sometimes going out to see a show is the thing to do. It's a tonic, a restorative thing.
Live performance! Actors talking, moving, singing! You hear the thump of movement, you see spittle flying from their mouths. Every night it's a test for them. It's a thrill for the audience.
So it was, and now it isn't. Part of the narrative of the continuing vicissitudes of the TV racket is the new embrace of live performance. As the whole world knows, it's terrifically hard to make money in the TV racket when the wretched viewers tape the show, watch it later and skip the commercials. Live TV, especially sports, is a godsend. The wretched viewer isn't going to watch later.
Apart from your big sports events, live competitive reality shows are the must-haves for traditional TV. The Voice going live, American Idol's live shows. And now it is a Broadway show with an odd cast. In Peter Pan you will find Allison Williams from HBO's Girls (she plays Marnie) as Peter Pan in a pixie hairdo, and Captain Hook is played by Christopher Walken.
This could be loads of fun. Possibly even a pleasure to watch. You might groan at times and you might be entranced. Call me cranky, call me a codger, but getting set to hate a live performance in advance is juvenile, and the term "hate-watch" is just hooey.
All times ET. Check local listings.