"Hill Street Blues" at 25 and finally on DVD

"Hill Street Blues" (Fox, $28 street). Hard as it is to believe that this show debuted 25 years ago, it's even harder to imagine that such descriptives as "gritty" and "dramatic" once applied to "Hill Street Blues."

Hailed in its day by critics, winner of 26 Emmys over six and a half seasons on NBC, the pathbreaking series finally arrives on DVD this week.

The path broken by "Hill Street Blues" has since become so well-trod that it's impossible to re-experience the thrill of seeing it for the first time. That opening episode, with fistfights breaking out in the precinct room, the shooting (and improbable survival) of two show regulars in a bad neighborhood, and the sexual dalliances involving Capt. Frank Furillo (Daniel J. Travanti) and his daytime nemesis, lawyer Joyce Davenport (Veronica Hamel) now seem as dated as that ridiculous, Curtis Sliwa-inspired outfit on street tough Jesus Martinez (Trinidad Silva).

Fortunately, you can enjoy it as a comedy. Certainly the show's creator, Steven Bochco, had a lot of laughs recording the commentary track for the pilot, as you'll hear on the DVD. The weird romantic life of Sgt. Esterhaus (Michael Conrad) was such a reliable scene lightener that even after Conrad's unexpected death midway through the show's run, he was written out with a joke about dying during intercourse. Travanti's deadpan stares were as hilarious as Jackie Gleason's. And the outbursts from the precinct's most unhinged cop, Belker (Bruce Weitz), "dogbreath!" "hairball!" instantly entered pop culture lore, along with Esterhaus' daily admonition to "be careful out there."

After "Cops," "Hill Street Blues" may be the funniest police show ever made.

"The Outsourcing Report"

Now here's a great idea for a TV show from a noncommercial outlet: a half hour all about trends in outsourcing. It's from The Working Group, whose work I've raved about in the past, including its series about labor, "Livelyhood." And lo and behold, who's narrating "The Outsourcing Report" but "Livelyhood" host (and friend of the Barn) Will Durst.

It's definitely got a point of view, which you can take issue with if you like. But at least Link TV, the satellite channel, is willing to try it. PBS should be doing a show like this -- and Lou Dobbs should be the anchor -- but public TV is too chicken.

Link: linktv.org/outsourcing.

"Hill Street": Drama + time = comedy

"Hill Street Blues: The Complete First Season" (Fox, $28 street). Hard as it is to believe that this show debuted 25 years ago, it's even harder to imagine that such descriptives as "gritty" and "dramatic" once applied to "Hill Street Blues." Hailed in its day by critics, winner of 26 Emmys over six and a half seasons on NBC, the pathbreaking series finally arrives on DVD this week.

World Poker Tour, Travel make up

They agree to cancel their lawsuits against each other and go make more money.   

Coming up: a stiff one

Will Durst's drinking game for Tuesday's State of the Union speech includes this beaut: "Whoever can correctly identify in advance the person giving the Democratic Response doesn’t have to watch it."

Woodruff seriously injured in Iraq

Eight days ago David Westin, the head of ABC news, told TV critics that the new "World News Tonight" would have a different look besides the faces of its two new co-anchors:

We wanted to make sure we got back out intothe field with our anchors, not just our correspondents,to do reporting.  Because ultimately it's all about reporting. ... And that'swhy you've seen Elizabeth [Vargas] in Iraq, even before we started the new broadcast, and Bob [Woodruff] in Iraq and also in the MiddleEast, in Jerusalem, when Ariel Sharon had his stroke. ... Next week Bob is going back to the Middle East because, as you know, there are the Palestinian elections where Hamas may play a very substantial role. And then he's going to go on to Iraq to do some more reporting there.  So that's part of it, how we gather the news and the role of the anchors in helping us report the news from where it's happening.

Unfortunately, it came at a cost today.

Link: ABC News Anchor Is Badly Injured by Bomb in Iraq - New York Times.

For example, John Kasich

A reader can't believe what some people will do to be on TV.

Nan A., hey hey, goodbye

Did anybody else notice that it was a website (thesmokinggun.com) owned by a cable TV network (Court TV) that exposed a so-called memoirist as an unrepentant liar (James Frey)? And that it was a TV personality (Oprah Winfrey) who finally summoned the million little doubts, expressed on Amazon.com and other sites over the past three years, and not only destroyed Frey on national TV yesterday, but may also have permanently damaged the career of his editor, Nan A. Talese of Doubleday?

And that the word that best describes this whole sorry matter was coined by a television personality: truthiness?

This isn't a corner of the publishing world I am remotely familiar with. As you may know, my wife wrote a book that we're publishing. We'll count ourselves lucky to get two prepublication reviews, whereas A Million Little Pieces got scores of them on the Talese name alone. The high end of the publishing biz needs television to keep those ridiculous sales levels up. It needs Oprah.

But what Oprah giveth, Oprah can taketh away. Boy howdy, did she on Thursday. Atoning for her defense of Frey on "Larry King Live," and then some, Winfrey admitted error and confronted Frey. Then came the real surprise. When Frey proved less than satisfactory in his apologies, she turned on his editor, Talese, who simply refused to admit that she did something very, very wrong in greenlighting Frey's memoir without so much as a fact check.

There is a rich irony in the fact that Nan A. Talese is married to Gay Talese, a man who is so scrupulous about details in his own reporting and contemptuous of celebrity authors who are "sloppy about facts."

Maybe that was Gay trying to reach Nan by cell phone yesterday (a ringer went off during the live broadcast of "Oprah"). Maybe he was calling to say: Dearest, you aren't apologizing enough!

Update: Jeff Jarvis bizarrely rants against Oprah, using an example that involves -- c'est coincidence! -- himself. How very Oprah.

Weekend viewing

Tonight, the recently appointed general manager of Kansas City Public Television begins hosting a talk show. It's one of several initiatives Victor Hogstrom has going to raise money for the perennially cash-strapped station. Below that, my review of Sunday's "Hallmark Hall of Fame" production, a curiously outdated remake of Pat Conroy's "The Water Is Wide."

Two sides to every story

The National Fair Housing Alliance is not happy with my (or the Times's) "renewed interest" in ABC's reality show "Welcome to the Neighborhood" (see previous). The spokespeople point out that "the Asian American family, Wiccans, and Latino family are all rejected and leave the program long before the 'enlightenment' about gay couples takes place." Hello, it's an elimination reality show. And anyway, the NFHA has won: I seriously doubt ABC will release the show, even if it means eating a million or two in off-net sales.

Annnnnnd, AC-tion!

On Tuesday, they merged two networks out of existence. On Thursday, they ditched their parks division. If I were working for Simon & Schuster, I would be getting up very early every morning to check the wires. CBS CEO Leslie Moonves is in the broadcasting business, and by month's end he may not be in any other business.

From Islamabad to Peculiar

Here's something that doesn't happen everyday.

KCTV-5, the news leader at 10 p.m. with its aggressive, "live-late breaking-investigative" approach to everything from sexual predators to wayward cars, just hired the replacement to former I-team reporter Steve Chamraz, who moved across state to KMOV-TV.

His replacement is Ash-Har Quaraishi ... who until recently was CNN's bureau chief in Islamabad. He speaks four languages, and covered the Danny Pearl story, among others.

Said his new boss, Regent Ducas, told me: "He and his wife had their first child and wanted to raise him back in the United States and more importantly the Midwest. He'll definitely add diversity and experience to the Kansas City market. He's experienced more in a short time than most local reporters have in their careers."

Oprah backpedals

Today she told James Frey she regretted defending his book and its million little lies. (Link: My Way News.) Also on the jump: Friday's "Oprah After the Show" continues the smackdown.

Pod said "Ha!"

Comedy Central, inevitably, has signed with iTunes. Now you won't have to BitTorrent all those "South Park" episodes.

Next on "Oddball": Monkeys in heat

Today on my KMOX show, Aaron Barnhart explained the implications of CBS and Warner Brothers merging UPN and The WB into a new network called The CW. Then we got into a heated discussion of "Love Monkey," the new Tom Cavanaugh vehicle which is doomed to failure because it's one of my favorite new shows.

Link: Paul Harris Online: Aaron Barnhart, TV Barn Radio.

That's, like, a season and a half of "SNLs"

Steve Martin will host "Saturday Night Live" for a record fourteenth time Feb. 4.

A million extra viewers

Oprah Winfrey, who's been defending author James Frey against all evidence that he fabricated the most dramatic part of his so-called life story, "A Million Little Pieces," will have him on her show Thursday.

That's all she wrote

"The Book of Daniel," the show that brought the worst out of everyone connected with it -- writers, actors, station managers, boycotters -- is being put out of our misery.

Last week Kevin Reilly, head of NBC Entertainment, was asked about all of the network promos that were airing during the program, a reflection of the sponsor avoidance that has dogged the show since pressure groups starting weighing in. Reilly cracked up the room with his ad lib: "Well, the Mattress King has stepped up           and he's going to sponsor the entire hour."

... Or not.

Link: Broadcasting & Cable: The Business of Television.

A South Beach show you'll watch

HBO's looking for black filmmakers to tell their stories. Top prize is 20G.

Merger hits home

Here's all you really need to know about the formation of the new CW network. In a nutshell, it will have "Top Model," "Gilmore Girls" and "Veronica Mars."

And, possibly, "The Julie Chen Show."

Beyond that, the 8-ball says try again later. But I did gather some local views and a few extra details I didn't see in wire reports:

Kansas City Star | 01/25/2006 | TV switch: WB, UPN join forces.

So what's going to happen to all those orphan stations left without a network? Wouldn't this be a prime opportunity for another media giant with a large library of syndicated (and, uh, syndicated-able) programs to jump in and start a new seventh network? (I'm counting Univision now, because Nielsen is.)

You know, like, Fox?