Cable’s TCA Tour: From Toothless Dogs To Naked Men In a Locker Room

Beverly Hills, Calif.—After four long and busy days here in Beverly Hills, cable’s portion of the Television Critics Association is wrapping up. The event had its moments, to be sure.

I admit that my eyes welled up when I saw the clip from WE tv’s The Locator, which is about a man who helps adopted people track down their blood relations. In the video, we were shown weepy men and women reconnected to their never-known or long-lost families. It was heart-wrenching.

And I was moved when I saw Georgia, one of Michael Vick’s abused—and toothless—pit bulls that’s been rehabilitated, a process that’s being depicted in National Geographic Channel’s show Dogtown: Saving the Michael Vick Dogs.

I was among the women gawking from afar when Jon Hamm (pictured), the star of AMC’s Mad Men, stood in the hallway of the Beverly Hilton talking to a band of reporters. I was glad that he was honest enough to admit, during a panel on the critically acclaimed show, that hey, he liked being considered a sex symbol.

After watching the first three installments of HBO’s Generation Kill, it was a treat to see and hear Evan Wright, the writer who wrote the book that the miniseries is based on. However, after watching the programming about the 2003 invasion of Iraq by Marines, I will never allow my blond nine-year-old niece to write letters to the troops abroad. When you watch Generation Kill, you’ll find out what I’m talking about.

The TCA had its cringe-worthy moments as well.

The clip from HBO’s Little Britain USA, which involved two naked men in a locker room—with one shaving the other’s bikini line—is unfortunately etched in my mind. As I told my colleague Linda, I should never have had to watch that on a big screen.    

But I guess that’s one of the sacrifices that members of the Fourth Estate have to make.