A Taste of ATH Part 1

Using or not using race when pointing someone out:

It's all a matter of approach.

Wrong: Walter is the darkie over by the Monet.

Overcompensating: Walter is the average looking guy of average height and weight and demeanor and race and mindset, standing amongst all those lumpy, too tall, too short, too snooty white trash over by the Monet.

Getting lucky: Walter is the guy in the Zoot Suit.

Too ignorant: If you know what a Monet is, Walter is standing by it. Or so I've heard from Jim and EJ. And if I knew Walter, I'd know where the Monet is.

Getting mixed up: Walter is over by the Monet. Wait a minute, do you mean Walter the halfbr*ed or Walter the sp*c or Walter the nig*er?

Being a jejune liberal: Walter is over by the Monet. You know, some of my best friends are like Walter.

Getting lucky #2: Walter is the only person in the room not wearing a sheet.

Avoiding the question with humor: This is a meeting of the "Walter Society". We're all named Walter.

Avoiding the question altogether: [does Mime impression]

Panics: I don't know. Why don't you ask EJ or Jim?

Subject: Re: What's Mary's Problem??
From: cbrady@csc.umd.edu (Cathlene Brady)
Date: 1997/02/02
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide

Derrick Hopkins (dhopkins@infi.net) wrote:

: BTW. We NEVER actually saw Olivia playing peekaboo. It might
: have been wishful thinking on Mary's part. Like when a baby
: babbles 'MGHHRDJFMA' and the mom goes wild telling everyone
: her kid just said 'Mommy'.

It really bothered me that the kid didn't play peekaboo. Either she is a rotten kid or an accomplished actress at a very young age. BTW, the baby is saying "Grandma".

Subject: What If: "NYPD Blue"-"Homicide" crossover
From: smthsen@bcvms.bc.edu (Sean Smith)
Date: 1997/01/23
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide,alt.tv.nypd-blue

PREMISE: The "Blues" are on the trail of a gang heavily involved in murder, armed robbery, extortion, mailbox destruction, etc., and learn that they are also active in Baltimore. So Simone, Sipowicz, et al, must fly down to Charm City to coordinate their investigation with a certain homicide unit, and members of both squads are paired with each other.

So, let's imagine some possibilities...

*Pembleton and Sipowicz--
(after long minutes of riding around in awkward silence)
S: "So, uh, whadda you guys use, Pampers or Huggies?"
P: "We prefer Huggies."
S: "Well, uh, me and Sylvia, I don't know, we're not that choosy-"
P: "Choosy? It's not a matter of being choosy! It is a matter of satisFACTION! If my daughter's diaper does not work properly, she will CRY. This will disTURB us. That is NOT satisfactory. Huggies has demonstrated its effECTiveness on a more consistent basis, and has earned our satisfaction. We REWARD those products that satisfy us."
(another awkward pause)
S (clearly annoyed): "Yeh, well, alls I know is, I'll use a freakin' plastic bag and duct tape as long as my kid ain't covered in his own urine when he wakes up. So Huggies can go kiss my Polish ass!"

*Simone and Howard--

(introduction in the squad room)
S: "Sgt. Howard? I understand we're workin' together. I'm Bobby Simone."
(He extends his hand. She shakes it, doesn't let go. Their eyes meet)
H (whispers passionately): "Take me."

*Munch and Medavoy

Munch: "-so we fall into the tall grass together, and she's rolling around screaming at the top of her lungs, the Boone's Farm Apple Wine is spilling all over the place-"
Medavoy: "I-I never got to go to a rock festival. But my ex-wife and I once listened to a-a Black Sabbath album together. Then the kids woke up and-and we had to turn it off."
Munch: "-and Hendrix is up there on the stage--you know about the conspiracy, right? It wasn't an OD that killed him--and he's just started playing 'Purple Haze' when she asks me to come back to the commune with her up in Vermont-"
Medavoy: "You-you know, I always liked that maple syrup from Vermont. I-I-I really enjoy putting it on my pancakes."

And wouldn't it be fun to see if James could manage to keep unfailingly polite around Kellerman, or watch Brodie pine for Russell ("Detective, could I stay in your hotel room for a while until I find an apartment of my own?")

Subject: Re: Sniper: Part 2
From: j-hill5@meibm22.cen.uiuc.edu (James Lloyd Hill)
Date: 1996/01/26
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide

mchasco@alpha2.csd.uwm.edu (Matthew Randal Chasco) writes:

> I need to ask a somewhat dumb favor of you... any of you:
> can anyone give me a brief summary of what happened in "Sniper: Part 2"?

You might recall the ending of _Sniper, Pt. I_ in which the detectives finished their shift and went wearily home, only to see on the news that a new round of shootings had transpired. Muttering, they went back to work. Well, except for Tim, who was stoned on painkillers and had crashed pretty hard.

Upon returning to work, Michael discovered that an evil computer genius had hacked into KITT's security and was using the car for nefarious purposes. (Sorry, I zoned out a minute there.)

At the House, a phone call came in from an anonymous tip who claimed to have seen two Arabers leaving the scene of the shootings. Frank, partnered with Brodie for the evening, went to the address specified by the caller. It turned out to be an abandoned warehouse. Keen detective that he is, however, Frank saw a shell casing in the corner under an old newspaper. Tightly rolled up and jammed into the shell casing was a receipt from "Foster's Bakery."

At Foster's, Frank discovered a ring of illegally employed Burkina Fasoans with HochlerMittelGruberFeldbergAufgerichsNachtDeutsch-980-Mark4 snipers' rifles. He took 'em all downtown (Brodie taping madly), put them all in the box, and within half an hour and gotten them to admit to a secret plot to destabilize Baltimore to keep the police busy...too busy to keep watch on the City Water Treatment Facility, where the Burkina Fasoans were planning to do a little "treatment" of their own. Namely, they planned to add a psychoactive medication to the wastewater treatment, so that when the treated water was released into Baltimore Harbor, it would cause the bay's fish to chase their own tails to exhaustion and death, at which time the Fasoans would scoop them out of the water as a delicacy for dinner.

The BPD raced to the sewage plant just in the nick of time, and as the detectives went home a second time, G passed Pembleton and said,

"Fine finish on the freaked-out fish for Fasoans, Frank."

<Fade to black, Executive Producer: Barry Levinson>

Subject: 6/15 episode
From: CROSSD@SCORPION.AG.UIUC.EDU (David Cross)
Date: 1996/06/15
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide

After watching last night's episode of _Homicide_, I find myself dumbstruck. However, since it's been over twelve hours since the episode ended and I've seen no comments on it, I guess I've not been struck as dumb as the rest of you.

According to _TV Guide_, the episode was called "NBA Finals: Bulls vs. Sonics." I've watched the episode four times already, but I've been unable to find any hidden meaning in the title, although the episode itself was crammed full of symbolism.

It became clear early in the show that this one was going to be different. I've come to expect that Homicide isn't afraid to shake thing up a little (including the camera), but I initially thought that we were watching something that was on television in the squad room or that someone was about to be killed at the game. After about two hours, it began to dawn on me that this might not be the case. With this knowledge, things became more clear in subsequent viewings. I would like to share some of my thoughts, in the sincere hope that I might spark further discussion of this landmark broadcast.

It seems clear to me that this show was intended to be allegorical in nature. I interpreted the game to be symbolic of the war that rages on the streets of our nation's cities. We see two rival factions, or gangs, going up against one another, stealing, shooting, and "burning" defenders, all in a contest with the "rock" (which is obviously street slang for crack cocaine) at its center. While the ten combatants are struggling with each other, three referees (obviously the police) attempt to keep order. These referees ignore all the actions listed above, and only attempt to punish the most egregious offenses.

While all these blatant activities are going on, there's also a subtle subtext of taunting and intimidation between the participants. It seems that, while vanquishing the opponent is important, achieving respect also weighs heavily on their minds. I found the silent glares and impassive obstruction of motion oddly compelling against the backdrop of loud screams and egregious physical assaults. Once again, the _Homicide_ team has found a poetic beauty where I would not have expected to see it.

The referees (the only authority figures that dare to come close to the action, drawing comparison between the league office and local politicians) are all smaller, slower, and older than the players. This serves to illustrate how today's gangs are sometimes better equipped than the police force charged with controlling them. Could this also be a sly wink in the direction of the old, broken-down white Cavaliers that our detectives use? In the end, it appears to be a losing battle for the forces of good.

The officials are outnumbered by over three to one, are largely ignored except when participants and spectators scream at them, and are woefully underpaid compared to the combatants. Just as drug dealers are highly rewarded monetarily and police officers receive a salary that is only a fraction of the amount most of us would require to consider doing the same job, the players are awash in money, getting millions of dollars each year just because they can throw a ball through a hoop (which reminds me, didn't the Aztecs play a game that was somewhat similar?

Why do we see no Aztecs in the NBA?), and you never see an official on television hawking "Air Refs" or advertising whistles.

When players are tired, ineffective or, in the very rare case, removed by the referees, there are always plenty more on the sidelines ready and willing to replace them. All the authorities can manage is to keep the action confined to the court (inner city). In the end, one of the gangs is declared the winner and the authority figures, never much in the spotlight to begin with, are forgotten. It's a very bleak picture, but none of us watches _Homicide_ for the happy endings, right?

One of the details that most captured my imagination was when they suddenly switched "turf" halfway through. After spending an hour or so viciously defending their respective areas, they took a short break and resumed battle *on opposite sides* from where they started. That one thing did more to illustrate the utter pointlessness of it all than anything else, and it's just one of the little things that makes _Homicide_ the big thing that it is.

Although a bit of a cliche, this episode also included a stinging indictment of the media and society. Using a crew that must have easily outnumbered the combatants, the media refuse to intervene. Instead, they broadcast the carnage for an eager public to consume. In fact, they glorified the actions of the participants, often referring to them as "warriors." While I didn't find this portrayal of the media to be particularly subtle, it was still a much better and thoughtful piece of work than Oliver Stone's execrable _Natural Born Killers_. On the other hand, I only managed to watch about 45 minutes of that movie, so it is possible that Mr. Stone could have stopped in the middle and said, "I'm sorry; this is crap. I'm also sorry for the _JFK_ conspiracy stuff. Currently, I'm in negotiations to do a film about Richard Nixon, and there's a good chance I'll be sorry about that, too. To help make up for it, I'm replacing the end of this movie with the last hour of _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_, but I doubt it. I also digress.

Another thing that I really enjoyed was the use of the patented _Homicide_ jump cut. It was used to great effect in this episode, especially when used in conjunction with slow motion, as in the following example:

<Spin to the basket and dunk.> <cut>
<Spin to the basket and dunk.> <cut>
<Dunk.>

While I truly enjoyed most of this episode, I thought that some of the dialogue left something to be desired. Especially grating were Marv Albert's constant repetition of the word "Yes!" and the convoluted ramblings of the Bill Walton character.

By breaking completely from the standard narrative form to which we've all become accustomed, _Homicide_ has shown us an entirely new type of television, and I believe that this episode will take its place on the short list of television that has pushed the boundaries, a list which includes the episode of _M*A*S*H_ with the clock in the corner showing the time elapsed during the treatment of a patient; the episodes of _Moonlighting_ in which they broke down the "fourth wall" and spoke directly to the audience and wandered off of sets and onto the studio lots; and of course the famous "Buddy-cam" episode of _Family_, in which Kristy McNichol wore a camera on her head, which the rest of the family mistook for a miner's helmet and a desperate bid for attention. I believe that the image of the Michael Jordan character driving the lane will be as enduring as the image of Buddy's teacher looking right at her (and us, the viewers) and saying, "What's with the helmet, Buddy? Are things all right at home?"

Once again, I stand in awe before the creative genuises behind this show. Five stars. Dave Bob says check it out. Don't forget to watch the special Sunday night episode.

David "I know Melissa Leo played Dennis Rodman, but was that Andre Braugher as the thin, bald, Michael Jordan?" Cross

Subject: Andre's Biography
From: j-hill5@meibm22.cen.uiuc.edu (James Lloyd Hill)
Date: 1995/12/11
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide

mr.bob@garlic.com (Felix Mariposa) writes:

>Could someone post a brief biography of Andre Braugher (AKA Det. Frank
>Pembleton)? Specifically, information on his schooling and acting
>training, as well as previous roles. Thanks!

Andre Braugher was born in Hoboken, NJ, in 1963. His parents, being members of an obscure religious sect, chose to educate him at home in the ancient language of Ngali. He learned not a single word of English during his first twelve years of life and was forced to communicate with his boyhood friends using a crude pantomime language jointly developed by Marcel Marceau and Wayne Newton. His peers, believing the Braugher boy to be mentally unsound, ridiculed him mercilessly. Consequently, Braugher's teen years were spent in speech therapy, trying to expand his limited English into a full-fledged vocabulary as well as to rid himself of a severe Ngali accent.

At 19 he joined the Merchant Marine, figuring they could give his empty life direction and purpose. Much to his surprise, he was picked out of his boot camp platoon to star in a drag burlesque performance of _Mame_ for none other than then-President Reagan. Reagan, stunned by the sight of a handsome black man in drag, had Braugher thrown out of the Merchant Marine, but by then he'd been bitten by the acting bug, as well as the tendency to dress in women's clothing.

Discharged by the Merchant Marine and generally unemployable, Braugher drifted aimlessly for the next several years. It was during the late 1980's that he struggled with homelessness and a crippling addiction to inhalant drugs, especially furniture polishes and glass cleaners.

Certainly doomed to wheeze himself into an early grave, Andre was saved by the intervention of none other than Jane Fonda, whose activism on behalf of cross-dressing sailors led her to search for the wrongly banished African-American who had been so highly regarded by the men with whom he'd served. She finally tracked him down in a women's shelter in Goodland, Kansas, clad only in a stained and tattered satin shift, singing "My Way" for a bowl of hot soup, a clean bed, and a whiff of some Eazy-Off oven cleaner. Fonda, like her esteemed father, brother, and niece, knew Talent when she saw it, and called her friend from the old days of legwarmers and aerobics, Barry Levinson, who'd produced her first exercise video, "Ho Chi Minh Does Buttcrunches, Why Don't You?"

Levinson was that very day preparing to cast a young actor named Jim Carrey in the role of Orthodox Jewish Homicide Detective Frank Pembleton, but when his friend Jane called, he rapidly changed his plans. Carrey was given the axe, though vague promises were made that he'd be famous someday anyway, really he would, and Braugher was brought in. Despite the poor condition of his voice, brought on by too many snorts of Lysol, despite the lice-ridden Afro so reminiscent of the 1973 NBA, despite the fact that a wrecked Braugher had lapsed back into heavily-accented Ngali patois, Levinson cast him.

"We'll make him a chain smoker," Levinson said. "That'll explain this most cruelly-abused voice. As far as the lice goes, shave his head. I understand that's the DopePhat thing nowadays."

"What about the accent?" asked Fonda.

"Ummm...shit. Tellya what: we shitcan the Copenhagen set and move the show to Baltimore. They all talk funny...sounds kindalike whatever gibberish this poor bastard is mumbling...yeah, Baltimore."

Or at least, that's what I read somewhere on Usenet, so it must be true.

Subject: Re: Past Characters
From: j-hill5@meibm22.cen.uiuc.edu (James Lloyd Hill)
Date: 7 Feb 1996 06:32:04 GMT
Newsgroups: alt.tv.homicide

tjmiller@mailhost.mnsinc.com (Brian Miller) writes:
>I knew the Ned Beatty and Daniel Baldwin were going to leave the show.
>Does anyone know what happened to their characters on the show?

I guess you missed the third part of the arson series that opened this season. Not surprising, since NBC held off on it and aired it out of sequence...sometime around Thanksgiving, if I recall correctly.

Ned Beatty (Stan Bolander) and Daniel Baldwin (Beau Felton) went to a policemen's convention in The Hague, The Netherlands. While there, they hooked up with a prostitute with a heart of gold. Stan bet Beau $4,000 that he (Beau) couldn't teach her English and manners in the two weeks they had left before returning to the States. The plan was to take the girl back to Bawlmer and have her pass as a local witness to a murder. If she could take an interrogation from Frank without cracking for at least 20 minutes, Beau pocketed the money. As a result, Beau sequestered himself with the prostitute for the remainder of their time to teach her what it meant to "be American."

Stan, his afternoons now free, decided to take advantage of lax Nederlander narcotics legislation to see if Munch's stories of drug rushes were at all accurate. One day in an opium den, in a heroin-induced fog, Stan was set upon by white slavers, who popped him atop the head with a belaying pin and dragooned him into the Royal Navy.

Unsurprisingly, no help was forthcoming, as Beau was intent upon winning his $4,000. Hour upon hour passed as he and the woman of negotiable virtue practiced such quintessential Americanisms as "I din' see nu'in" and "are you arrestin' me" and "just because you're teachin' me English don' mean you get freebies." And all the while, poor Stan was carried farther and farther away...towards India, the land of the dawn and of the Raj.

In India, Stan was roughly hustled off the ship and taken before the high Abujamal, where he stood proudly and declaimed, "You can't do this!"

<cut> "You can't do this!"
<cut> "You can't do this!"
<cut> "You can't do this!"

For his show of defiance, he was branded on the lower leg with the sign of a goat in rut, symbolizing the ancient act of repudiation reportedly committed by the Buddha, who had told a King "Screw you, goatboy!" But despite the pain and infection, Stan was not afraid, for he knew that Beau would come for him.

The days passed, but there was no sign of Beau, who himself was fighting off infection of a different kind back in the Netherlands. Eventually, the shot of penicillin conquered the microbes which had laid waste to his immune system and he returned to the hotel for his prostitute, for by now Beau knew that what he felt in his heart for the street girl, no, urchin, was not mercenary greed, but love. Yes, love. He, a Baltimore city homicide detective had lost himself in the wet brown eyes and the rich chocolate skin of her. He needed to see her again, to smell her hair again and to hear her throaty voice saying "Not until you pay me" again. But when he got back to the hotel, the girl was gone. Believing herself rejected by the sexy if somewhat overweight American who looked so much like the guy she had seen in that movie with Bill Pullman and Nicole Kidman, the immigrant meretrix had returned to her native land...home...to India.

India...where the sun burned hot. India...where the nights were lit by the flickering flames of recent widows. India...port of call for a lovestruck Beau Felton.

He strode off the Merchant Marine vessel, bored nearly to tears from telling the skirt-clad sailors that no, he didn't know anybody named "Braugher." He had learned from his violent interrogation of the hotel manager that the girl's name was Irian. Irian Abujamal. The other girls who worked the hotel sometimes had told him her father was a very wealthy man; a warlord who thought nothing of having an army of slaves at his beck and call. Beau got his address from an AltaVista search (very quick, given the amount of data to be sorted and searched) and bought a fare. This was in Beau's mind as he stormed into the man's palatial estate. Well, this and the thought that he probably wasn't going to get his $4,000 now that the plan had gone to sh(THIS WORD CENSORED UNDER THE PROVISIONS OF THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS ACT OF 1996, ART. 12, SEC. 5 SUBPGRPH D). But wait! Who was this pale, ragged, pustulent man being held before the Abujamal? It was Stan! Stan Bolander, the Big Man, the bulldog himself! "Stanley! Stanley! It's me! Beau!" he cried.

"Beau! I knew you'd come!" croaked a weakened Bolander. "You gotta get me outta here; they're going to kill me!"

"Why? Whatever for?"

"I won't join the Abujamal's army and I can't afford a ransom."

"How much is the ransom?"

"A million abdul-jabbars, or in US currency, about four grand."

"Hey, that's what you owe me for the bet."

"Yeah. Tellyawhat, loan me five so I can tip the Abujamal and when we get back to America, I'll pay ya ten. That's a repay on the five, a default on the bet, and a grand for your trouble."

Beau, always strapped for cash, agreed to the deal. He arranged to have the money wired immediately, and when it arrived the next morning, he purchased Stan's freedom. The girl, no more than a rhetorical tool to get Beau into India, was already forgotten.

When the fatigued and battle-hardened men staggered back into the unit, they found that their adventure had caused them to be two days late, so Gee had 'em fired.

Pretty good episode, but don't look for it to be re-run because of the nude scene between the woman gladiators and the hockey team.

On to Part 2

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