Time is short for filing your income taxes before Tuesday’s midnight deadline, so here are some quick items for you to digest before you get back to work. And remember, you can’t file for an extension just because you wasted time watching UPN’s “The Burning Zone”:
– We have nothing against sultry singer Anita Baker. Her standard “Sweet Love” is a tune that no one sings better.
But no one can sing the theme song to NBC’s Tuesday night comedy “Mad About You” better than Andrew Gold, either. His breezy, carefree rendition of the slick, jazzy song expertly conveys the loopy, lighthearted tone of the series.
Since the beginning of April, however, Baker has been crooning the reworked “Mad” theme, which now is kind of sexy and languid. And it will be on a new album of songs inspired by the relationship of Paul and Jamie Buchman (Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt).
“Anita Baker has such a velvet voice,” Reiser says on an Internet site. “And, here’s the thing–she sings the word `baby’ sexier than anybody in the world ever has.”
Maybe. But she still doesn’t do the song justice quite the way Gold does. As Baker sings it now, you would think Paul and Jamie spent the majority of their time making out.
But take heart, “Mad” fans. You can find Gold’s “Mad About You (Final Frontier)” on the TV theme song compilation “Television’s Greatest Hits Vol. 7.” And a longer version of the original, with extra lyrics from Reiser (who wrote it with super-producer Don Was) also will appear on the “Mad” album, which is scheduled to hit stores Tuesday.
Gold says–in the same Internet site–that he is a little mad about his version disappearing from the show, but he thinks his and Baker’s renditions may alternate episodes.
– Martin Lawrence doesn’t have to worry about writing his “Martin” co-star out of his show anymore. The 5-year-old Fox comedy is calling it a series on May 1 with an hour-long sendoff, partly because Lawrence wants to concentrate on his movie career.
The show’s end is timely given Lawrence’s recent publicized run-ins with the law. Just a few weeks ago the comedian was detained for allegedly hitting a man in a nightclub after the guy bumped into him on the dance floor.
Lawrence probably would have faced a sixth season with his character divorced. That’s because Tisha Campbell, who plays Lawrence’s wife, Gina, on the show, filed a sexual harassment suit against him and left the show for several weeks. She settled the matter out of court and returned to finish the season, but Campbell probably wouldn’t have returned for another year.
An interesting side note: Tichina Arnold, who plays Gina’s best friend Pam on the show, is scheduled to make a pilot for a potential spinoff series, with Pam embarking on a singing career. One of the executive producers of the pilot? Martin Lawrence.
Campbell alleged in her suit that she asked “Martin” producers to install a lock on her dressing room door to keep Lawrence out. Wonder if she passed along any advice to her girlfriend?
– Recently, Ellen DeGeneres publicly revealed what a lot of people in the industry already knew: She’s gay. The star of ABC’s “Ellen” made the disclosure in last week’s Time magazine cover story.
“I always thought I could keep my personal life separate from my professional life,” she said in the story. “In every interview I ever did, everyone tried to trap me into saying I was gay. And I learned every way to dodge that. Or if they just blatantly asked me, I would say I don’t talk about my personal life.”
As most are probably aware, DeGeneres’ TV character will come to the realization that she is gay in an episode to air April 30. It will be the first time an openly gay TV star plays a lead character who is also homosexual.
There have been several brush fires about this subject. An ABC affiliate in Birmingham, Ala., said it wouldn’t show the episode. Morality groups have blasted DeGeneres and the network for allowing the historic move to go forward. Jerry Falwell labeled the comic “Ellen DeGenerate” (a play on her name that DeGeneres herself has joked about in her standup act for years).
Here’s the thing: We’ve known DeGeneres for several years. She is warm, personable, charming and friendly. We like her as a comedian and a human being. Not only do we applaud her career-risking move to declare her sexuality, we’re proud of her.
Perhaps all of this will help rejuvenate a series that has never really lived up to its star’s considerable talent and wit.
– Where’s the remote: “NYPD Blue,” whose spot on the ABC schedule wasn’t wasted when the captivating series “The Practice” aired there for several weeks, returns with new episodes starting at 9 p.m. Tuesday on WLS-Ch. 7.
Also on ABC Tuesday is a new series with the right title for the right actor. “Blues Brother” Dan Aykroyd stars in “Soul Man” at 7:30 p.m. on Channel 7, playing a minister with four kids, and a neighbor to Tim “the Tool Man” Taylor (Tim Allen) of “Home Improvement.”
