July 2009

Former Army Ranger and Air Force Pararescue expert Wil Willis was due to retire from active duty when he signed on to play a real-life Rambo in a new Military Channel series. In each hourlong episode of Special Ops Mission, airing Thursdays beginning August 13, Willis is dropped into an area with a specific goal. He’s in contact with those who dropped him, but on the ground, he’s on his own. Like Les Stroud in Survivorman, he carries a camera to record his progress. To make things really difficult for him, a group of equally trained experts knows he is […]

Even her darkest days as Sgt. Suzanne “Pepper” Anderson can’t compare to Angie Dickinson’s trials since her daughter’s death in 2007. Life has definitely changed — but she’s taking things one day at a time and getting back in the saddle. “I like to act,” she says. “It’s just something I love doing, and I don’t think I miss it until I go back and do it. But I don’t have a goal anymore. I don’t have any plans. I just kind of go along with it. I don’t think that’s necessarily good, but that’s the way it is.” This […]

Talking to Wendy Williams, even via telephone, is a lot like sitting down your chattiest best friend. There’s an openness about her that is astonishing, and I got a feeling that a half-hour on Wendy’s couch would be more therapeutic than a year of weekly of visits to a professional therapist. This is one woman who has her act together and is not afraid to tell others how to do the same with theirs. Williams began her career as a radio DJ. As her rabid fan base grew, her radio show was syndicated. Soon, she began making guest appearances on […]

In HBO’s newest comedy, Hung, Thomas Jane (The Punisher) stars as Ray Drecker, a well-endowed high-school legend turned underpaid, uninsured, embittered high-school basketball coach who markets his best asset (reference the title of the show) in an attempt to piece his life back together. As you can expect, that doesn’t always go as planned. Jane, who is always a colorful and candid interview, recently talked to us about his role and life in general. Jane’s introduction to the series and the premise of Hung … Thomas Jane: I think Alexander Payne called me up and said, “I’m doing a show […]

One of the new Syfy series helping viewers to “Imagine Greater” (SCI FI Channel’s new tagline after rebranding itself as Syfy) is Warehouse 13, airing Tuesdays beginning July 7. The show follows Secret Service agents Pete and Myka (Eddie McClintock and Joanne Kelly), who are reassigned to the title location — a top-secret government facility in South Dakota where strange and often supernatural relics are collected. Taking care of the place is Artie (Saul Rubinek), who charges the new agents with chasing down reports of activity that may be related to artifacts needing to be warehoused before they threaten humanity. […]

The first thing you notice about Adhir Kalyan is the accent — perfectly, almost classically British sounds more like that of a young Richard Burton than the exotically accented star of the comedy series Aliens in America or the love-struck Pahud of Paul Blart: Mall Cop. But Kalyan was born in South Africa and spent much of his life in Britain, where he took acting lessons. So far, his career has not included Shakespeare or a remake of The Jewel in the Crown, but it could. For now, he revels in creating unique accents for his characters. “What I try […]

The late ’90s saw a glut of mostly forgettable teen movies come and go at the multiplex, but 1999’s 10 Things I Hate About You managed to stand out. Transplanting Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew to a modern-day high school setting, it launched the careers of Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger. And while those other teen flicks gather dust, 10 Things has been granted new life as a TV series. Coming to ABC Family beginning July 7, the plot of the half-hour comedy is essentially the same as the film: Sisters Kat and Bianca adjust to life at Padua […]