I went to several Everybody Loves Raymond tapings when I lived in LA and I couldn't get over how good that cast were. I don't have any memory of them slipping up or having to reshoot those famous long scenes you spoke of. One of the few plusses of being in a wheelchair is that you get to sit on the studio floor instead of the seating with the rest of the audience, and Brad Garret bringing me a pizza when it looked like filming of one particular episode was going long is still a highlight. I saw The Angry Family and Marie's vision done live and when I watch them now they still make me nostalgic. It still feels very relevant but also the last of its kind. I appreciate The Big Bang Theory and Two and Half Men were both big studio sitcoms to come after Raymond, but those didn't speak to me in the same way that Raymond did, so for me, it feels like the very last great studio sitcom. I admired that finale so much just because it felt like an ordinary episode of the show but also something different that felt more real than anything they'd done before.
That’s extra impressive because, again, they were doing really really long scenes by sitcom standards. So for the actors to not break or flub a line like that is very cool.
There are gag reels on the DVD and I went to the tapings hoping to see "live bloopers' but it was so tightly done and it was clear the cast got on really well and that were all complete pros. I was incredibly impressed. I went to do The Drew Carey Show a few times too and I remember them getting things wrong, laughing or tongue-tied. Which was really fun.
They showed a brief gag reel at the end of the Paley panel. It's not so much bloopers as a situation where, after the first take or two, Ray had permission to try alternate punchlines that the other actors weren't prepared for, just to see if the new lines, and/or their reactions, were funnier than what was originally scripted. Sometimes, the actors played along; other times, they couldn't resist breaking character.
He's a great improviser and I know he liked breaking the rest of the cast. In the episode where Ray and Deborah try and spice up their bedroom lives with a board game, there are several retakes after Patricia tells him she's going to ring the company to complain "and while you're at it tell them square six doesn't work and vinger burns! "While you're at it tell them square six and it 2 or 3 days they can have their dice back!" Brilliant.
A great show. Though it was a sobering moment a few years ago when I realized I was now older than those guys were supposed to be when the series started.
I'll probably try and hang with Smoke, just because Dennis Lehane is one of my favorite writers of all time. He's in that rarified tier of "I'll read anything he writes" when it comes to novels. I love his narrative voice.
However, it does feel like that voice doesn't come across the same in his film/TV projects. Maybe that's more due to the collaborative nature of the medium.
Some people loved Black Bird, the last thing Lehane did with Egerton, but it didn't do a lot for me. I liked this one significantly more, despite its big flaws.
If Smoke is on Apple TV that means it's dropping week-to-week, right? So viewers need to watch one frustrating episode, wait a week, and then watch nearly all of a second frustrating episode before the big click? Sounds like a show that should have dropped all at once.
It is my understanding that apple usually drop the first two episodes of the first season of a show at once. I think it’s because they allow anyone to watch the first episode for free, so that means there is still another episode available if the first one is enough to convince someone to subscribe.
Smoke is dropping the first two episodes at once before going one per week, yeah.
I highly recommend The Futon Critic even though it’s kind-of an eyesore. Just search a title in the header and, on the show’s dedicated page, click “view all related listings”. Every couple of weeks I click the month next to “premiere dates” under Today’s Featured Story on the home page and then either in daily or monthly view I click the more expansive “show only new episodes” to plan out the next couple of weeks; “show only premieres” is the default, although it includes finales and special airings too.
I wish I would have remembered "Common Side Effects" a couple weeks ago when you were looking for shows to watch. I had watched the show when it came out and enjoyed very much. Especially, the relationship between the two FBI agents. They had a very unique and interesting relationship where you could tell they respected each other's abilities. It is probably because I am a big fan of Martha Kelly. Whenever I hear her distinct deadpan delivery, my interest perks up. Did you ever watch "Carol and the end of the world"? It came out a couple years ago on Netflix. She was the star in that one. I also enjoyed it quite a bit. It was about a directionless woman trying to figure out what she wants in life in the face of a meteor heading towards earth.
The NYTImes recently ran a "Best of 2025 TV so far" article and mentioned Common Side Effects, which I had on my list to try out, so good to hear that was worth your effort, Alan. They also raved about a Japanese period drama called Asura on Netflix. I am meaning to check out both of these, not sure if you've heard of Asura, Alan, or what anyone might have been saying about it.
I mentioned Asura here a couple of months back. How dare you not retain encyclopedic knowledge of every comment on your columns, Alan!
We only got a few episodes in before life stuff blew up our schedule for a while and haven’t returned to it yet as other shows took precedence with spoilers and zeitgeist, etc.; it was a little hard to keep the characters straight at first but the cultural and family dynamics were compelling.
I hadn't heard of it either but I'm not on social media, figured maybe there was some chatter. This part of the blurb got my attention but also sets the bar high:
"The series 'is the full package: a detailed, human-scale domestic drama with plenty to say, fascinating characters to say it and the stylishness to make it sing,' Margaret Lyons writes. 'The downside is that other shows feel paltry and thin in comparison. The upside is everything else.'"
Hey Alan - Did you sample The Waterfront? I tried one episode and was not compelled to watch more. I wouldn’t give dropping it a second thought if it weren’t for Kevin Williamson’s involvement. (Dawson’s Creek and Scream buy him a lot of benefit of the doubt from me.) But this strikes me as yet another disposable season of Netflix programming. Still, I am curious if it improves.
You got a half an episode further than me. My friend Linda Holmes dubbed it “Taylor Shore-idan ,” which felt about right. Given my boredom with this type of show relative to their popularity, I assume it will be a big hit. But Williamson has been a pretty iffy TV creator for a while now.
Nobody remembers it, and I don't think it ever aired in the US, but there was a previous show Egarton starred in a decade ago called *The Smoke*.
It was a firefighter show, and did a great job of making firefighting look absolutely terrifying, something that nobody in their right mind would do, but I mostly remember it for two things:
1. The scene in the first episode where series lead Jamie Bamber whips off his pants at a fancy gala, revealing his horribly disfigured genitalia, courtesy of a fire he was injured in months earlier. https://youtu.be/UWlsUjFleUg?t=2470
2. It having the wildest bait-and-switch cliffhanger ever, where the penultimate episode ends with Bamber finding out that his girlfriend (Jodie Whittaker) died tragically in the massive fire they were fighting in that episode... and the finale starts with him walking out of the coroner's office, complaining that the body they asked him to identify doesn't even look like her, and it turning out that she was perfectly fine. Then the finale was mostly them having a pleasant time, which kind of felt like a "fuck you" to Rescue Me's super-depressing season endings.
I went to several Everybody Loves Raymond tapings when I lived in LA and I couldn't get over how good that cast were. I don't have any memory of them slipping up or having to reshoot those famous long scenes you spoke of. One of the few plusses of being in a wheelchair is that you get to sit on the studio floor instead of the seating with the rest of the audience, and Brad Garret bringing me a pizza when it looked like filming of one particular episode was going long is still a highlight. I saw The Angry Family and Marie's vision done live and when I watch them now they still make me nostalgic. It still feels very relevant but also the last of its kind. I appreciate The Big Bang Theory and Two and Half Men were both big studio sitcoms to come after Raymond, but those didn't speak to me in the same way that Raymond did, so for me, it feels like the very last great studio sitcom. I admired that finale so much just because it felt like an ordinary episode of the show but also something different that felt more real than anything they'd done before.
That’s extra impressive because, again, they were doing really really long scenes by sitcom standards. So for the actors to not break or flub a line like that is very cool.
It would appear the Paley YouTube will have your Raymond panel on Sunday!! Looking forward to it.
There are gag reels on the DVD and I went to the tapings hoping to see "live bloopers' but it was so tightly done and it was clear the cast got on really well and that were all complete pros. I was incredibly impressed. I went to do The Drew Carey Show a few times too and I remember them getting things wrong, laughing or tongue-tied. Which was really fun.
They showed a brief gag reel at the end of the Paley panel. It's not so much bloopers as a situation where, after the first take or two, Ray had permission to try alternate punchlines that the other actors weren't prepared for, just to see if the new lines, and/or their reactions, were funnier than what was originally scripted. Sometimes, the actors played along; other times, they couldn't resist breaking character.
He's a great improviser and I know he liked breaking the rest of the cast. In the episode where Ray and Deborah try and spice up their bedroom lives with a board game, there are several retakes after Patricia tells him she's going to ring the company to complain "and while you're at it tell them square six doesn't work and vinger burns! "While you're at it tell them square six and it 2 or 3 days they can have their dice back!" Brilliant.
I have a real fondness for “Men of a Certain Age.” Great writing and acting about a subject not usually explored in tv land.
A great show. Though it was a sobering moment a few years ago when I realized I was now older than those guys were supposed to be when the series started.
I'll probably try and hang with Smoke, just because Dennis Lehane is one of my favorite writers of all time. He's in that rarified tier of "I'll read anything he writes" when it comes to novels. I love his narrative voice.
However, it does feel like that voice doesn't come across the same in his film/TV projects. Maybe that's more due to the collaborative nature of the medium.
Some people loved Black Bird, the last thing Lehane did with Egerton, but it didn't do a lot for me. I liked this one significantly more, despite its big flaws.
Thought Black Bird was...ok. I enjoyed the performances (Hauser and Liotta especially), but it also was a bit of a tough slog.
At least Smoke got to its point in two episodes rather than doing what Sugar did.
If Smoke is on Apple TV that means it's dropping week-to-week, right? So viewers need to watch one frustrating episode, wait a week, and then watch nearly all of a second frustrating episode before the big click? Sounds like a show that should have dropped all at once.
It is my understanding that apple usually drop the first two episodes of the first season of a show at once. I think it’s because they allow anyone to watch the first episode for free, so that means there is still another episode available if the first one is enough to convince someone to subscribe.
Smoke is dropping the first two episodes at once before going one per week, yeah.
I highly recommend The Futon Critic even though it’s kind-of an eyesore. Just search a title in the header and, on the show’s dedicated page, click “view all related listings”. Every couple of weeks I click the month next to “premiere dates” under Today’s Featured Story on the home page and then either in daily or monthly view I click the more expansive “show only new episodes” to plan out the next couple of weeks; “show only premieres” is the default, although it includes finales and special airings too.
I wish I would have remembered "Common Side Effects" a couple weeks ago when you were looking for shows to watch. I had watched the show when it came out and enjoyed very much. Especially, the relationship between the two FBI agents. They had a very unique and interesting relationship where you could tell they respected each other's abilities. It is probably because I am a big fan of Martha Kelly. Whenever I hear her distinct deadpan delivery, my interest perks up. Did you ever watch "Carol and the end of the world"? It came out a couple years ago on Netflix. She was the star in that one. I also enjoyed it quite a bit. It was about a directionless woman trying to figure out what she wants in life in the face of a meteor heading towards earth.
Everyone should rent this movie, "Exporting Raymond":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoGwRYUeo1E
Phil was as fun in person as he is on TV. The building has a slide from the 2nd floor to the 1st floor, and he went down it twice.
I do wish the spin-off of Robert Barone had happened. I think it would’ve been successful like Frasier than the dearth of Joey.
I know Brad Garrett has had a successful post-ELR career doing mostly voice-acting but he deserved a better follow-up than ‘Til Death.
"Raymond" is beloved in my family and still watched every night in syndication.
I'm a "Dawson's Creek" fanatic and have zero interest in watching "The Waterfront."
The NYTImes recently ran a "Best of 2025 TV so far" article and mentioned Common Side Effects, which I had on my list to try out, so good to hear that was worth your effort, Alan. They also raved about a Japanese period drama called Asura on Netflix. I am meaning to check out both of these, not sure if you've heard of Asura, Alan, or what anyone might have been saying about it.
First I've heard of it, I'm afraid. Too much TV! Even post-Peak TV!
I mentioned Asura here a couple of months back. How dare you not retain encyclopedic knowledge of every comment on your columns, Alan!
We only got a few episodes in before life stuff blew up our schedule for a while and haven’t returned to it yet as other shows took precedence with spoilers and zeitgeist, etc.; it was a little hard to keep the characters straight at first but the cultural and family dynamics were compelling.
I hadn't heard of it either but I'm not on social media, figured maybe there was some chatter. This part of the blurb got my attention but also sets the bar high:
"The series 'is the full package: a detailed, human-scale domestic drama with plenty to say, fascinating characters to say it and the stylishness to make it sing,' Margaret Lyons writes. 'The downside is that other shows feel paltry and thin in comparison. The upside is everything else.'"
Hey Alan - Did you sample The Waterfront? I tried one episode and was not compelled to watch more. I wouldn’t give dropping it a second thought if it weren’t for Kevin Williamson’s involvement. (Dawson’s Creek and Scream buy him a lot of benefit of the doubt from me.) But this strikes me as yet another disposable season of Netflix programming. Still, I am curious if it improves.
You got a half an episode further than me. My friend Linda Holmes dubbed it “Taylor Shore-idan ,” which felt about right. Given my boredom with this type of show relative to their popularity, I assume it will be a big hit. But Williamson has been a pretty iffy TV creator for a while now.
I felt the same way, that I was watching Yellowstone on the water.
I also loved Common Side Effects! I watched it week to week as it was coming out and it was such a weekly highlight.
Nobody remembers it, and I don't think it ever aired in the US, but there was a previous show Egarton starred in a decade ago called *The Smoke*.
It was a firefighter show, and did a great job of making firefighting look absolutely terrifying, something that nobody in their right mind would do, but I mostly remember it for two things:
1. The scene in the first episode where series lead Jamie Bamber whips off his pants at a fancy gala, revealing his horribly disfigured genitalia, courtesy of a fire he was injured in months earlier. https://youtu.be/UWlsUjFleUg?t=2470
2. It having the wildest bait-and-switch cliffhanger ever, where the penultimate episode ends with Bamber finding out that his girlfriend (Jodie Whittaker) died tragically in the massive fire they were fighting in that episode... and the finale starts with him walking out of the coroner's office, complaining that the body they asked him to identify doesn't even look like her, and it turning out that she was perfectly fine. Then the finale was mostly them having a pleasant time, which kind of felt like a "fuck you" to Rescue Me's super-depressing season endings.