• June 11, 2007
• Vol. 67
• No. 23

TV

By Tom Gliatto, CHRISTINA TAPPER

What's On This Week

SUNDAY, JUNE 3

SHOT IN THE DARK
10:30 P.M. | HBO

Entourage star Adrian Grenier's personal documentary about his search for and reunion with the biological father he'd never really known.

2007 MTV MOVIE AWARDS
8 P.M. | MTV

Sarah Silverman hosts—saaaay, what about giving her the Oscars gig too? Jessica Biel and Lindsay Lohan will present.

MONDAY, JUNE 4

HELL'S KITCHEN

9 P.M. | FOX
The men are teamed against the women in a new season of British superchef Gordon Ramsay's hot-tempered reality cookoff.

CREATURE COMFORTS
8 P.M. | CBS

Whimsical series from Wallace & Gromit creator Nick Parks: His familiar stop-action animals speak dialogue from real on-the-street interviews.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6

AMERICAN INVENTOR
9 P.M. | ABC

Season 2 of the reality show co-created by American Idol impresario Simon Cowell: Contestants pitching ingenious new products vie for development money, with a $1 million grand prize. (Last year's winner invented a new car seat.) Judges include George Foreman, ex-boxer and grill salesman extraordinaire.

THURSDAY, JUNE 7

FAST CARS & SUPERSTARS
8 P.M. | ABC

Jewel, skater Tony Hawk, Serena Williams and the omnipresent William Shatner learn to race stock cars.

TUESDAY, JUNE 5

AMERICA'S GOT TALENT
9 P.M. | NBC

How'd you like to face that firing squad? Sharon Osbourne joins Piers Morgan and David Hasselhoff as a judge on the reality contest's new season. Jerry Springer, who's a wonderful dancer, is the host.

THE SHIELD
10 P.M. | FX

Final night for Season 6. Shane (Walton Goggins) has gotten in a bit too deep with an Armenian mobster's daughter, leading to some excellent moments of panicked drama.

Army Wives
Lifetime, June 3, 10 p.m. ET | [3 stars]
DRAMA

Kim Delaney stars in a satisfyingly meaty drama about officers' wives on an Army post. Delaney plays Claudia Joy Holden, who holds her own unofficial rank of moral authority among the women. There are hints, however, that secrets from her past are on the march into the present. Concerns about losing spouses to war don't register here as strongly as do the ladies' domestic crises—including a mess over surrogate twins. In one subplot, what appears to be a case of spousal abuse turns out to be a serious issue I don't recall ever seeing treated in a series. Wives gets a medal for that.

John from Cincinnati
HBO, June 10, 10 p.m. (ET) | [1.5 stars]
DRAMA

This new series, co-created by David Milch (Deadwood) and scheduled to move to 9 p.m. once The Sopranos goes, is about three generations of a dysfunctional family of legendary California surfers. The Yosts have foul tempers and souls as twisted as driftwood. Then arrives John (Austin Nichols), a strange young man by way of Cincinnati. John attaches himself as a sort of apostle to drug addict Butchie Yost (Brian Van Holt). John seems to be a holy fool, parroting conversations and somehow triggering an improbable, rising tide of miracles—Papa Yost (Bruce Greenwood) has even started to levitate. The tone of the first three episodes is grubby yet also precious. Which can induce channel surfing.

On the Lot
FOX, Mondays and Tuesdays, 8 p.m. ET | [2.5 stars]
REALITY

Ratings weren't all that stellar for the premiere of this new series, which arrives with gold-plated production credits: Its executive producers are Mark Burnett (Survivor) and director Steven Spielberg. Maybe they should have come up with a dazzling opening-scene shot in one long, continuous take—Yau-Man being chased by one of those Indiana Jones boulders, for example.

Instead they created a less daring but still enjoyable contest pitting wannabe filmmakers against each other for a $1 million development deal at DreamWorks. (That much money probably wouldn't cover Shrek's teeth whitening, but never mind.) In the opening episode, contestants tried to pitch ideas to judges Garry Marshall, Carrie Fisher and Brett Ratner. Most of the pitches were horribly off, but Marshall and Fisher, both famously funny, managed to be kind. Fisher, admitting she didn't really like having to pick one contestant over another, added, "I don't even like picking lobsters in the restaurant."

Possibly the show could use a little more shark. How about Entourage's Ari Gold as a judge?

More From This Article

30 Years After Roots Levar Burton

Burton, 50, played young slave Kunta Kinte in Roots, the landmark 1977 miniseries about race and history, now available in a special 30th-anniversary DVD set.

WHAT WAS ROOTS' AFTERMATH? It ignited a cultural revolution in this country, in terms of our common interest, black and white America, in our lineage. Everyone wanted to trace their roots.

DO YOU REWATCH IT? I have over the years. I had a chance to share parts of it with my 13-year-old daughter. But she's still not ready to see her father in chains. Those are difficult images.

WHAT DO FANS SHARE WITH YOU ABOUT THE MINISERIES? Blacks, as well as whites, have always come up to me and said it either brought them a new sense of pride or a new sense of understanding about who we are and how we got here. That's very powerful.

Ranting Rocker Henry Rollins

As host of his own talk show on IFC, the politically outspoken punk icon, 46, gets uncensored with guests from Ben Stiller to Gore Vidal. PEOPLE's Mark Dagostino tossed out some topics for him to take on ...

TELEVISION It's not really a part of my life. Rescue Me is A-plus. The Shield is awesome. But I've given up on CNN, MSNBC ... I've never seen American Idol [or] Desperate Housewives. I'd rather have my nose in a book or see something that is going to educate me.

ROSIE O'DONNELL I think that Rosie's a person with zero fear factor. She's like, "I'm going to say what I want and you can kiss my—!"

CELL PHONES I love it when it doesn't ring. Don't text me. And don't call me unless your leg is falling off. I'm a misanthrope and I'm angry. Gotta go.

IRAQ America's chock-full of good people. But it's incredible that you wouldn't love your country enough to try to get an understanding of Sunni and Shi'a in that part of the world, where your sons and all your money are going. The Iraq war is going to be our topic for the rest of our lives.

HIS CAREER I never set out to be a TV dude, but it allows me to talk to people I find interesting and gives me a place to put that big mouth of mine.