It’s Christmas, the season for bad TV, and so here’s another post detailing another new reality TV show on US telly.
Remember when the Sheriff would get a posse together to round up the bad guys? Well things have moved on since the Old West days and now Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa Count, Arizona has called on TV producers to join his deputies in catching criminals in “Smile … You’re Under Arrest!”
A cross between “Punk’d” and “Cops,” the program sets up elaborate sting operations to snare people wanted on outstanding warrants. Actors and undercover deputies play along in faux scenarios where scofflaws are enticed to have a good time; the drama comes when cast members reveal the prank and waiting deputies slap on handcuffs.
Sounds like good clean honest crime-busting fun to me.
Strictly Come Dancing finishes tomorrow night on BBC1 in a blaze of glory (or should that be anger over the votes scandal) and upwards of over 6 million people will tune in to see who dances to glory.
Fearless cowboys will ride in three dangerous events each night-bareback riding, saddle bronc riding and bull riding-an unprecedented test of endurance in modern rodeo competition. In reality-show style, one competitor will be pulled each week in a sudden elimination bull ride match, with the ultimate Toughest Cowboy champion winning the deed to a Rocky Mountain ranch near Laramie, WY.
If you’re in Raleigh, North Carolina on 3 January 2009 then stop by - the first 500 kids even get a free cowboy hat!
And there’s more good stuff too. Visit the official website at toughestcowboy.com and you can read all about “international rodeo star and a true cowboy, Whiplash, the Cowboy monkey” - yes that’s right the 21 year old Capuchin monkey “has been riding since he was two years old”.
Now that has to beat John Sargeant shuffling through the tango any day of the week!
is the La Posada Hotel. At the intersection of Route 66 (now called 2nd Street) and State Route 87 in historic downtown Winslow to be precise.
That lyric is more commonly associated with the 1972 hit by The Eagles “Take it Easy”, the song that put Winslow back on the map again after it was bypassed by the new I-40 Interstate that replaced the historic Route 66:
Well, I’m a standin’ on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, and such a fine sight to see It’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin’ down to take a look at me
La Posada embodies the visions of both Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter, the hotel’s renowned architect, and Allan Affeldt, its current owner. But the story really begins with Fred Harvey, who “civilized the west” by introducing linen, silverware, china, crystal, and impeccable service to railroad travel. (He was so legendary that MGM made a movie called The Harvey Girls starring Judy Garland.) Harvey developed and ran all the hotels and restaurants of the Santa Fe Railway, eventually controlling a hospitality empire that spanned the continent.
Harvey brought good food and lodgings to the American railroad network in the 19th century in the shape of ‘Harvey Houses’ - his legacy is so interwoven with travel in the American west that there’s now a wiki set up for interested parties to share documents and information about the Fred Harvey Company.
When Harvey died in 1901 there were 47 Harvey House restaurants, 15 hotels, and 30 dining cars operating on the Santa Fe Railway.
The La Posada was built by architect Mary Colter in Winslow, site of the the Arizona headquarters for the Santa Fe Railway. For more on the history of the build and for a review of the restored hotel read Ron Dungan’s travel piece on the Arizona Republic website.
I love ghost towns and Nevada is full of them, left over from the gold mining days when towns sprang up almost overnight and then were abandonned when the gold was gone.
Since Wayne referred to the 1952 Western High Noon as “the most un-American thing I’ve ever seen in my whole life” because of its depiction of frontier townspeople as cowardly, it’s reasonable to assume that the conservative cowboy actor would have despised David Milch’s HBO series.
With just days to go (for presents arriving by post anyway) HBO have just released a new box set of the three seasons of their infamous western TV show set on the 1870s frontier.
I usually like a good HBO series, Six Feet Under being a great example of the risk-taking channel. The freedom to swear so frequently in a TV show always seemed to me to add realism to a medium where ‘damn’ is usually the nastiest insult on prime time British TV.
I never did catch many episodes of this show though perhaps because I could never get my head round Lovejoy being evil!
Ian McShane is a fine actor but having grown up with the genteel ramblings of an East Anglian antiques expert I never could see past that loveable rogue exterior. Now I know why David Tennant fears Dr Who typecasting…
Anyway, our American cousins can now take advantage of the new box set with extra features on the town and ideas for future movies. In the UK you’ll have to make do with the heavily discounted old edition on Amazon.
Before you rush off though be sure to vote on my Deadwood poll:
If you’re in Raleigh, North Carolina on 3 January 2009 then stop by - the first 500 kids even get a free cowboy hat!
Loading ...
