Results tagged “bravo”

The November issue of Pasadena Magazine has a cover star who, until recently, was more of a behind the scenes kind of guy, despite the often cocky swagger and 'tude. It's Chef Michael Voltaggio, who took over Chef de Cuisine duties this summer for The Dining Room, the swanky old-school restaurant at the Langham that's been turned upside down by Voltaggio's cheeky and innovative style of cuisine. LAist was lucky enough to be invited to sample Voltaggio's fare just days before the current season of Top Chef debuted on Bravo; on the show you'll see Voltaggio battling it out for honors with none other than his big brother Bryan.

            

There might be models of ships ensconced in the walls of the Langham's Dining Room restaurant that reflect a bygone era, but there's a young tattooed man on the cutting edge of cuisine in the kitchen. His name is Michael Voltaggio, and he arrived at the beautiful historic hotel in Pasadena just this July, following a year working as Executive Chef of The Bazaar by Jose Andres in Beverly Hills. Tonight, he'll be in your living room (or bedroom, perhaps)--no, he's not making house calls, he happens to be (along with his older brother, Bryan) a contestant on Bravo's 6th season of Top Chef.

The Dining Room is the fine dining restaurant located within the The Langham, Huntington Hotel & Spa. Not only are they a great "special occasion" dinner destination, but they can boast something pretty unique: A one-star rating from the coveted Michelin Guide (it's the only hotel-run restaurant in Los Angeles with one). Now the restaurant is prepping for their new Chef de Cuisine's menu, which will debut on July 31st.

The TV Junkie Plan: "Better Off Ted", "Lost" (maybe), "MythBusters" (if not "Lost"), "South Park", "Reno 911!", Letterman, Fallon.

The TV Junkie Plan: "Better Off Ted", "Lost", "South Park", "Reno 911!", Leno, Fallon

Ad spending in the US dropped by 2.6% in 2008, with only cable increasing ad revenue for the year. TV and cable still retained a leadership position as the preferred media, taking more than 60% of all ad dollars.

Today in the web TV world, Josh Schwartz's (Gossip Girl, The O.C., Chuck) music-themed web series, "Rockville CA" premieres on TheWB.com. The show features both indie favorites and up-and-coming bands such as Eagles of Death Metal, The Broken West, and Bishop Allen. “Rockville CA” is set in a fictional Los Angeles rock club and was shot on location at The Echo, which is an actual, real rock club, that you might have heard of if you have a heartbeat.

Critics are being rather forgiving of Jimmy Fallon's (only slightly shaky IMHO) "Late Night" debut: they brought out DeNiro who is always a tough interview and Fallon kind of made it work, and Timberlake kind of saved the first show - not sure why they had Van Morrison on, are they trying to reclaim the age 55-and-up demographic?

It looks like Andy Richter will be returning to the side of Conan O'Brien when he fires up his version of "The Tonight Show" starting on June 1st. Richter will be the announcer for the show and will appear in comedy sketches but it's not clear if he will be a fixture on the guest couch a la Ed McMahon. Now that the Academy Awards are over with and Conan has shut down production, late night TV is a wasteland this week other than Jimmy Kimmel.

We have a host of finales tonight but the ones to keep an eye on are Timothy Hutton's "Leverage" (10pm on TNT, pictured right) and John Lehr's "10 Items or Less" (11pm on USA). Of local note, KNBC will be doing a special at 9pm on their historical 60 years of broadcasting in Los Angeles. KNBC helped define the medium of television and is due many accolades for it's services to the community over these 6 decades.

Today AMC launched the beginning of a series of webisodes for its excellent series, "Breaking Bad", in advance of its new season starting on March 8th.

While we still don't believe that Joaquin Phoenix's schtick on Letterman last night isn't anything other than a stunt, it doesn't mean that show's like "Late Night" need to go along with it. Do the producers of his latest movie, we don't even remember what it's called, think that this has helped them? What's your take - is Phoenix faking or tripping?

Last week we went to a sneak preview of Demetri Martin's new show on Comedy Central, "Important Things With Demetri Martin", which premiere's tonight at 10:30pm. The show has been in the works since last Spring so we are happy to see it make it on air.

Truth is stranger than fiction - or life imitates fiction? Something like that: Anna Torv and Mark Valley, the stars of FOX's "Fringe", have married in real life. Fringe also did pretty good in yesterday's Nielsen numbers, with a 10+% increase in viewership over last week, but that increase is getting attributed to the popularity of its lead in, "American Idol".

Sir Paul McCartney will pay a visit to Comedy Central's "The Colber(t) Repor(t)" tonight - we're wondering if Colber(t) will succeed in performing a song with yet another famous musician. [Also Colber(t)-related is his latest "remix challenge", so all you audio-tweakers should check out the details here.]

Still flying high after attending the SAG Awards last night, hope you saw our Twitterstream of pics yesterday, you can see them again here. We will have many more pics and video clips of the event for you soon.

There was no way to avoid President Barack Obama's inauguration today if you were anywhere on the 'net, radio, or television - well, maybe if you were watching the Game Show Network you might've missed it. Most media organizations jumped into this inauguration with both feet which was encouraging. Hulu and Facebook streams were reportedly failing, along with several others. Twitter seemed to do OK after doubling capacity in preparation for the day.

We're shattered over the death of Emmy-award winner Patrick McGoohan who died yesterday in LA at the age of 80. McGoohan made his first mark on TV in the series "Danger Man" (released in the US as "Secret Agent") and won his two Emmy awards for his work on Peter Falk's "Colombo" which he acted in, produced, directed, and wrote several episodes.

There's only three weeks to go until the Super Bowl and NBC still has to sell some ads so they're looking to the movie studios to fill up the remaining (10%) of slots. So what we're saying is that at least 1 out of 10 ads will be for a movie, with all the ads adding up to over $200 million for NBC.

Feeling lazy yet? Well, that's why we're here. Ms. Warner chatted with us about getting and staying fit, her upcoming projects, and how you (yes, you!) can take advantage of what her gym has to offer, so that your firmly-held resolutions don't wind up in the same place as your wilted, dying Christmas tree.

Fans of "Beverly Hills, 90210", and we mean the real original fans, might be elated to know that, yes, Tori Spelling will be joining the cast of the new "90210" sometime around the 19th episode this season so I guess you had better start watching now so that you know what the heck is going on when she makes her debut.

HBO has acquired the exclusive rights to air Barack Obama's inauguration kick-off events on January 18th. The actual inauguration ceremony will be carried by several outlets but the 90+ minutes of live performances preceding the ceremony will exclusively belong to HBO. In 1993, paid $1.5 million to air the performances preceding Bill Clinton's inauguration but unlike that year, HBO says it will provide access to all viewers and not just HBO subscribers.

Remember how we mentioned that Jack Black will be on the post-Super Bowl episode of "The Office"? He will also have Jessica Alba, and America's new dance sensation, Cloris Leachmen as company at Dunder Mifflin.

Lately it's been all about the 3-D, and lately it's been all about anything Turner-flavored (they seem to be pumping out new shows on TNT and TBS every other day), so naturally the two must meet. On February 14th, because they love you, TNT will team up with Cinedigm to broadcast TNT's coverage of "NBA All-Star Saturday Night" in 3-D to 160+/- theaters in 35 states. If only they chose a real game, then we'd be a bit more interested.

So everyone's seen that NBC is offering Leno a 10:00pm program after he hands off "The Tonight Show" to Conan in the Spring. NBC is trying to protect an aging segment of its audience by doing this and the end result is that they are going to undermine Conan O'Brien's takeover of "The Tonight Show". Since a good percentage of viewership can get Leno at 10pm, NBC is creating a disincentive for viewers to try out the new version of the show as helmed by Conan. This begs the question: don't Republicans have enough late night TV options? Isn't that what Glenn Beck is for?

TNT is pulling out all the stops for its launch of their Timothy Hutton-driven action-thriller series "Leverage" (premieres on Sunday 12/07 @ 9:00pm). They've got a major press tour (more on that, Friday) and they're even launching an online game on Sunday where players can win $100,000. We haven't seen an effort this coordinated in a while.

Oops, she did it again: Were you one of the 3.7 million people who watched Britney on Sunday? That "documentary" blew all of MTV's other shows out of the water, viewershipwise, other than their Video Music Awards broadcasts. Happy Birthday Britney.

While we're still recovering from last night's fantastic series finale of "The Shield" we can still open our eyes to the fact that this extended weekend stinks in terms of TV (unless you love football).

When watching local programming, like the news for example, did you notice how many ads there are for cars and trucks? One's mind easily cuts these ads out, with the exception of Cal Worthington and His Dog Spot, but the problem is that these ads contribute a huge amount of money towards the production of local programming raising the specter of local TV becoming a thing of the past if the big automakers go under. When one reads articles about a potential $25 billion bailout the possibility of local TV going under seems a little more real. Not that we are in support of the bailout of automakers - this is an industry that lobbied against reforms that would have resulted in more responsible products that people would actually want to buy. Our opinion is that local broadcasters need to find alternative sources of advertising dollars as soon as possible.

Despite how much some people might despise the show, "American Idol" has organized a very capable charity with its "Idol Gives Back" event. The event, which was held in April, resulted in the donation of over $64 million to six domestic and international charities including The Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria; Malaria No More; Children's Health Fund; U.S. programs of Save the Children; Children's Defense Fund; and Make It Right, Brad Pitt's campaign to help New Orleans recover from Hurricane Katrina.