Iconoclastically Speaking

O.K. , I confess, I watched a quasi-reality show last night…something about a woman named Kathy Griffin or Griffith or Griffis…all about her life on the celebrity D-list. Apparently she wants pity as she struggles to move up from the Hollywood D list to a higher echelon in the La-La Land pecking order. It seems like a tough sell to me. Her ‘travail du jour’ or 'nuit' last night was that she was trying to re-decorate her house and only had a $100,000 budget. Poor thing, I felt her pain!

All that being said, the show was mildly entertaining and that leads me to the point of this blather. I have discovered a way to fame and fortune and because I am the Prince that I am I’m going to share it with you. All you need is a stupid idea for a reality TV show. The show I saw last night was on the Bravo channel and apparently they will buy anything.

Bravo re-runs West Wing episodes almost every night. The neo-cons hate it because it depicts a liberal Democratic administration, reason enough to like the show in my opinion. Politics notwithstanding though,West Wing is,in my opinion, one of the best written, best produced and best acted shows in the history of television. The Bravo network, being the paragons of taste that they are will pre-empt re-runs of good material in favor of absolute reality drivel.

This poor comedian’s tale of woe that pre-empted West Wing last night was a TV highpoint though compared to another of Bravo’s monumental television creations, “Pet Show Moms and Dads”, the saga of a whole raft of obsessed neurotic dog owners in search of vicarious recognition through chasing their dream of having a champion poodle, Yorkshire terrier, or some other of the 161 breeds recognized by the American Kennel Club. (Hey, before you scoff, I went and actually counted them!) I never watched the show but the previews told the story. If you have seen Christopher Guest’s gem of a movie, “Best In Show” my guess is that you have seen all the crap from “Show Dog Moms & Dads” that a body could possibly stand.

Anyway ladies and gentlemen, there’s your formula for fame and fortune…find a mindless, stupid idea for a reality show and certainly one of the hundreds of cable channels will find a way to slide it in between info-mercials. You’ll be on your way….that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.