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Kathryn Hahn on Comedy Cliques, Working With Paul Rudd, and Joe Lo Truglio’s Huge Penis in Wanderlust

Kathryn Hahn starred for years on the dramatic Crossing Jordan, but dabbled in comedy via Adam McKay and Will Ferrell–driven films Anchorman and Step Brothers. This year, Hahn is attacking the genre full-force. After her sitcom Free Agents was canned, Hahn signed on to play an upcoming part on Parks and Recreation. She’s also a manic, opinionated hippy-type in Wanderlust, the latest David Wain–directed film that stars a bevy of other talented comedic folks like Paul Rudd, Jennifer Aniston, Justin Theroux, and Ken Marino (plus Joe Lo Truglio’s huge prosthetic penis), about a Manhattan couple who finds their way to a Georgia commune. We chatted with Hahn about comedy cliques, her strange serendipity with Paul Rudd, and what it’s like to be a control freak in Hollywood.

"As soon as you take a deep breath, you have the rug pulled out from you." »

Justified Recap: Both Sides Against the Middle

You couldn't blame Raylan Givens for feeling a little bit helpless this week. Consider:

  • After last week's "Dear John" letter from Winona, he spends a good deal of this episode searching for her in vain, only to discover that this isn't the first time she's tried to leave him in the past six months. Not only that, but Art, Tim, Rachel ... they all knew about it. 
  • He discovers that Boyd and Arlo have been running oxy out of Aunt Helen's house — still the one thing sacred to Raylan in Harlan.
  • Owing to his lawman obligations, he finds himself in the position of having to snuff out Boyd's competition, effectively doing Boyd's dirty work for him (no wonder Quarles come to the erroneous conclusion that Raylan is in Boyd's pocket).

Raylan's not used to being bounced around by outside forces like this. Thank God he gets to take small pleasures in things like repeatedly punching William Mapother's sleazy pimp character, Delroy, in defense of recurring prostitute Ellen May. It's the little things sometimes.

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New Girl Recap: Schmidt Gets Cheesy

At first glance, it makes sense that Jess Day is a teacher, given her childlike enthusiasm and penchant for singing. But as this episode points out, Jess has a big flaw as a teacher, and that’s her lack of authority. Kids aren’t going to be won over by cuteness, because come on, they’re kids — they win cute-offs every day. And few demographics are less forgiving of aggressive quirkiness than a room full of tweens.

“Sad Sparrow (Imagine a World Without Bullies)” »

  • Posted 2/22/12 at 9:30 AM
  • Deals

X Factor’s Rachel Crow Gets a Nickelodeon Show

Rachel Crow, the vivacious tyke who was brutally eliminated from The X Factor last season, has emerged from the icy mystery of Nicole Scherzinger's vacant stares and landed her own show. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the 14-year-old Crow has a deal with Nickelodeon for a musical-comedy pilot and a five-episode arc on the truly hideous yet popular among children Fred: The Show. She's also signed with Columbia to put out her own album, so the old adage is right: Good things do come to those who have completely understandable yet deeply unsettling meltdowns on television!

Cougar Town Recap: No Use Crying Over Spilled Fake Blood

So, wedding planning seems like a nightmare. That’s what I understand from television, anyway, because once your proposal is locked down it is all business and no fun going forward. Your every decision could widen the gulf between your girlfriends. Your ex-husband will have to worry about what to bring as a gift. Napkin rings always seem to be a big cause for concern, for some reason. All this, just to marry the man with the tiniest eyes you’ve ever seen. How will he even see you from the altar, when you’re walking down the aisle? His eyes are too little.

Penny Can Watch: frustratingly still on. »

Glee Recap: Suicide and Regionals

In the beginning, it seems like any other ho-hum Tuesday on Glee — one scoop nonsense, two scoops racism, a bushel of Mr. Schue being insensitive, and a peck of scientific impossibility. In the beginning. First, Sebastian corners Rachel and Kurt at the Lima Bean ("Well, if it isn't a young Barbra Streisand and an old Betty White" — good line!) to deliver a dire warning: He has jankily Photoshopped Finn’s face onto some pictures of a dude in ladies’ shoes with a bare-naked Johnson! Curses! And he threatens to upload them to “THE INTERNET” unless Rachel agrees to drop out of Regionals so the Warblers can achieve an incredibly unsatisfying fake win! Because that makes total sense — I’m sure everyone in Ohio is spending nights and weekends Googling the name of the world’s most terra-cotta high school show choir performer, and, if they are, would give TONS of cares about a glaringly fake and narcoleptically tame Photoshop project. I’m sure. Not even considering forfeiting the spotlight for one goddamn moment, Rachel is like, “That is show choir terrorism!” and announces to the glee club that she WILL perform at Regionals regardless of the consequences for Finn’s genitals. Finn is mad for sixteen seconds. Then Mr. Schue, predictably unhelpful, literally says, "You guys are just going to have to deal with things like this!” Because he is a sociopath.

Like, you know what I like about choirs? Humans singing. You know what I like about Nicki Minaj songs? NICKI MINAJ. »

  • Posted 2/22/12 at 12:45 AM
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Britney Spears Interested in Judging X Factor

Could Britney Spears leave her conservatorship-approved cocoon of tightly controlled media appearances to become a judge on The X Factor? Us is reporting that Spears and her team have been in touch with Simon Cowell for a slot on the show, while Fergie and the previously rumored Janet Jackson are also in the mix. Spears recently avoided taking the stand in a multi-million-dollar lawsuit with Brand Sense when her reps said she was "not fit to testify" owing to the conservatorship held by her father (which gives him control over nearly every aspect of her life), but would she be mentally fit enough to pass judgment on other singers and withstand the rigors of a live show?

That Louis C.K. CBS Sitcom Will Now Star Ashley Tisdale

Because there was no way the tale of a Louis C.K.–produced sitcom airing on CBS was going to get any less weird, now High School Musical's Ashley Tisdale will star. She'll play Petra, "the beautiful and sarcastic assistant to a vintage clothing designer struggling to carve out her niche in New York," Deadline reports. But has she seen C.K.'s stand-up bit about young ladies exactly like Sharpay?

Dennis Quaid, Michael Chiklis to Face Off in CBS Pilot

Our spies tell us that Dennis Quaid negotiating to star as the lead in CBS’s newly green-lit Nicholas Pileggi pilot, Ralph Lamb, and he'll be squaring off with Michael Chiklis. Pileggi is best known for writing Goodfellas and Casino, and Ralph Lamb is his look sixties Las Vegas from the eyes of its lawman, a real-life former rodeo cowboy who became the longest-serving sheriff of Clark County during most of the sixties and seventies. Quaid would play Lamb, while Chiklis is signing on as his mobster nemesis. James Mangold, who directed Cop Land and 3:10 to Yuma, is directing the Lamb pilot.

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Community Returns!

The wait is over: NBC says Community will return to its schedule Thursday, March 15 at 8 p.m. (We'll pause so you can fist-bump your neighbor.) As part of a midseason sked shuffle, 30 Rock shifts back to 8:30 p.m. And Parks and Recreation? It takes a breather until April 19, when it returns in a new (old) time slot: Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. (Up All Night will have completed its season by then.) Elsewhere, NBC is burning off new comedy Bent by airing double episodes of the show Wednesdays at 9 and 9:30 p.m. for three weeks, starting March 21. Then, on Wednesday, April 4, NBC premieres Betty White's Off Their Rockers at 8 p.m., followed by new comedy Best Friends Forever. So really, there's double good news today: Community is returning, and there will be no more episodes of Whitney and Are You There, Chelsea as of April, at least for this season.

Theater Critic Scott Brown Reviews Smash’s Show-Within-the-Show for Week Three

Welcome back to my “review”-within-a-review of the show-within-a-show-within-Smash. (In case it was unclear: All those hyphens and quotation marks connote the supreme unseriousness of this whole project. Obviously, there’s no actual Marilyn: The Musical yet, despite director Derek Wills’s mid-hump assurances that eight songs and “half” the book are in the can. (I hope these "reviews" of mine have been taken in the show's general spirit of chutzpah.) But, as the "show" "continues" to "evolve," it's time to stop the à la carte reviewing and let Marilyn grow into her ballgown a bit. This will be my last review for a while, and I'll wait to weigh in later on the "finished" show.

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The Bachelor Recap: When Your Family Ruins Your Chance to Be a Princess; or, Courtney, Humanized

This week on The Bachelor, we're down to the final four, which means hometown dates and Ben awkwardly meeting the families of the cutthroat contestants he's chosen. Yep, Lindzi, Kacie, Nicki, and, especially, Courtney, didn't just beam down to Earth in a poof of spray-tanner. They have parents and siblings and terrible couches just like the rest of us.

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