The Point Radio: Alan Alda On 30 ROCK Vs MASH

TV and movie vet Alan Alda explains why he came back to television for 30 ROCK and how that show compares to his days on MASH, plus Mark Waid sez Bye To Boom and NetFlix just became even cooler! And be sure to stay on The Point via , RSS, MyPodcast.Comor Podbean! Follow us now on and ! Don’t forget that you can now enjoy THE POINT 24 hours a Day – 7 Days a week!. Updates on all parts of pop culture, special programming by some of your favorite personalities and the biggest variety of contemporary music on the net – plus there is a great round of new programs on the air including classic radio each night at 12mid (Eastern) on RETRO RADIO COMICMIX’s Mark Wheatley hitting the FREQUENCY every Saturday at 9pm and even the Editor-In-Chief of COMICMIX, Mike Gold, with his daily WEIRD SCENES and two full hours of insanity every Sunday (7pm ET) with WEIRD SOUNDS! CLICK HERE TO LISTEN LIVE FOR FREE or go to GetThePointRadio for more including a connection for mobile phones including iPhone & Blackberrys.

Transcript

Hello, it's Mike Raub. Welcome to The Point, where all parts of pop culture come together. Alan Alda sits down to take us on a tour of television comedy from MASH to 30 Rock. In the meantime, look at this. Mark Wade says bye bye to BOOM!

And Netflix just got that much better. It's Friday, December the 10th, 2010. Sit back and let's get to The Point right now. This is The Point, The Point radio, get The Point radio. Actor Alan Alda has the dual responsibility of being well a face familiar to all of us

on television, yet somebody you don't see in new shows that often. Alan, however, has stepped into a recurring role on the NBC series 30 Rock. What drew him to that show? When I first went on 30 Rock, and this is now the third time I've been on the show, I had the same feeling about the group there that I had when we were doing MASH.

It's a very collaborative company. Everybody knows where they're going and what they're doing, and they all are supportive of one another. They all recognize one another's personal personalities. They're one another's…

I'm sorry, that's redundant. They all recognize one another's unique personalities. They work with them, they play with them, they work around them. They're very tuned into one another just the same way we were. It's very nice to see that.

It's a pleasure to see that. Plus, they're working in a way similar to what we did, only in a very different kind of comedy. It's similar to us, and they're taking chances, and we took chances. We were officially a comedy, but we worked in drama and satire and all kinds of different

forms. On this program, I think they're expanding to another kind of comedy, and that's risky. The people who love it, I think, recognize how interesting and funny in a new way it is, and I'm one of those people who love it. I think it's just great.

Broadway, television, movies, Alan's a guy who's liked to take chances and challenges in his career. It's really true that when I get a chance to do something new, something interesting, something that I had never done before, like write a couple of books, like be on 30 Rock and share that experience with people who were pushing the frontier a little bit, it's

very exciting to me. I realize that it's something that I wouldn't have had. That includes, by comparison, things I just mentioned are trivial compared to seeing my grandchildren grow up and seeing my daughters mature and become who they were destined to be from the time they were little girls, but I might not have seen that.

It has changed my life, and I enjoy things a lot more. I even enjoy complaining more. With movies on his resume like Betsy's Wedding, Sweet Liberty, and a ton of great episodes of MASH, Alan's work as a director has pretty much gone unchallenged. Is that a job he'd ever like to go back to?

It's interesting. So many people want to be directors. There's an old joke that somebody is meeting Mother Teresa and telling her how wonderful she is, and she says, yeah, but you know what I really want to do is direct. It's because everybody wants to, but I did that already.

I did it on MASH. I did it in several movies that I wrote and directed. The experience itself, I don't really need to do it anymore, and I don't need that feeling of power. There is a wonderful feeling of power when you're a director, especially on a big movie,

less so on a television show. But you can say, I'd really like that building painted yellow, and the next day it's yellow, or you say I'd like to have it moved over there, and it's gone. That feels pretty good, but I don't think I need that, and I'm okay without it. So, no, I'm very happy to just play on 30 Rock and in movies and that kind of thing.

We've got more coming up with Alan. In the meantime, catch his appearance on the Christmas episode of 30 Rock rolling right now at NBC.com and Hulu. It's Friday, December 10th, 2010. Here's what's going on in pop culture.

Speculate all you want, but there's no real facts behind it so far. However, it's true. Mark Wade leaving his post as the chief creative officer of Boom Studios. Wade will remain with the company to write three titles, Irredeemable, Incorruptible, and The Book He Writes along with Stan Lee, The Traveler.

He'll be doing that in a freelance capacity, and I guess we could also assume that he'll also be doing freelance work for Marvel and DC. More to be increased and announced as the new year hits. It's only obvious that with the Broadway play and some of the other teased covers we've seen over the past few days, this has got to happen.

Then I'm back at Marvel in a new ongoing series that will premiere in March, written by Rick Remender and art by Toni Moore. First issue we'll have a cover, by the way, by Joe Quesada. There's a little bit of a new look to the character, but more new background as well. Venom is now working for the government as a covert agent.

Again, first issue of the new series, which is ongoing, premieres from Marvel in March. There's probably no better time in his career to do this. Walking Dead, the executive producer and writer Charles Eggly is now talking to FX and Sony about getting involved with the Powers series. It's been in development.

Well, for a long time by that cable net. Meanwhile, there are also reports that creator of The Walking Dead, Robert Kirkman, and director of the first series for AMC, Frank Derembont, will be more involved with the second season and not taking input as much as they did during the first from outside writers. Much like the soap opera genre on television, the daily or even weekly comic strip seems

to be in danger as well. And now there's another blow to that. Brenda Starr reported the seven day a week strip is going to be ending coming very soon. January 2nd will be the last strip. Brenda has been in the papers for 70 years up until 1980.

The creator, Dale Messick, also wrote it. Ramona Fraden, best known for Metamorpho and Aquaman over at DC, was involved with the strip for a long time as well. The good news here, however, is that Brenda will kind of have an afterlife. Hermes Press has announced that they've picked up the rights to release Brenda in chronological

order beginning sometime early in 2011, available in bookstores and in comic stores as well. Well, it certainly was in no family jewels to Hasselhoff's, the new A&E show that showed the behind the scenes life of David Hasselhoff and his daughters. Well, it got pulled after two episodes from A&E. Only about 718,000 viewers tuned in for the premiere, only 500,000 for the second episode.

And that's it as far as A&E is concerned. It's one of those properties that's had well a couple of different lives in the comic shops over the past few years, both from Dynamic Forces and Devil's Dew. Now Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, gets some new life from Moonstone, the people who originally did the Phantom, and also do things like Voltron, Buckaroo, Banzai, and The Saint as well for

comics. The new series will have nothing to do with the previous incarnations. It'll be written by Paul Story, art will be by Jake Miner, and it involves a Sheena who's propelled in time to deal with exactly what condition mankind has left the world in that future era.

Look for release dates soon for Moonstone's new Sheena series, which begins with an issue zero. Good news from Muppet fans who now get their movie fix a little earlier than once intended. Originally it was planned for next Christmas to be the release date of the new Muppet movie. Now it's set for November 23rd.

Disney's had a ton of success releasing films over the Thanksgiving weekend, so why not do it next year with one of their biggest guns of all time? The film stars among the Muppets, Jason Segal, Amy Adams, Chris Cooper, and Rashida Jones as well. There'll be tons of cameos from people like Billy Crystal and Alan Arkin and a lot more.

As you know, longtime Muppet fan Jason Segal also wrote the movie as well. There's another reason to give a Netflix membership for Christmas. They're about ready to cut a deal with ABC Disney to get some of their programming not too long after it airs, maybe even as quickly as two weeks. Disney's agreed to provide Netflix access to programming from the Disney Channel, ABC,

and ABC family as little as just about two weeks after it airs, sometimes a little later than that. Shows covered include stuff from ABC family like Greek and Melissa and Joey from the Disney Channel, Phineas and Ferb. Even older shows like Lost and Ugly Betty as well.

Get more information of course if you keep checking in the Netflix while you're buying those subscriptions to stuff into your family's stockings. Sci-fi has given a green light to the new series, Alphas, that comes from the writer Zach Penn who you know from X-Men Last Stand and The Avengers as well. They've ordered 11 episodes and a 90 minute pilot directed by Jack Bender from Lost.

Alphas is about superheroes, people with enhanced mental and physical abilities who gather together to fight the crimes that the CIA, the FBI, and the Pentagon have not been willing or able to solve. Look for the pilot to roll sometime into the summer of 2011 on Sci-Fi. This is my gold.

If you aren't planning on buying your loved one a brand new car this Christmas, do not despair. There's always the Super Bowl. This year's Super Bowl number of X, V, L, and Y pie will offer us at least 20 new car commercials covering about one third of all the commercial time during the game.

That's more than three times last year's game and almost double the record. General Motors will be there and BMW is coming back. Mercedes is buying into the Super Bowl for the first time ever and some people have the nerve to say our economy sucks. Of course they'll be selling tires and beer and soda and boner pills as usual.

Denny's won't be there, nor will Monster.com. I don't know how you can buy a car without a job, but Monster.com won't be helping out. As of this writing, the halftime ban hasn't been announced, but it's likely to be another bunch of geriatrics who won't expose any female nipples to the little children. This is my gold on America's true pop culture channel.

Get the point. Radio.com. I have very small desires in life. Titties and beer, you know? What?

Titties and beer. No, no, man. You're joking. Titties and beer. Titties and beer.

Titties and beer. Titties and beer. Titties and beer. Titties and beer. Titties and beer.

It was Batman at the top of the list for the best selling comics in November, but not necessarily a good month at all. In fact, when you compare it to last year, the number one comic, well, that sold about 144,000. It was Blackest Night number five.

And when we get to the number one comic on this list, it sold less than 100,000 in comic shops in November. The top 20 best selling comics from November in comic stores started number 20 with Amazing Spider-Man 649 for Marvel. Number 19, Amazing Spider-Man 647, number 18, Uncanny X-Force, number two.

Forward number one, by the way, with the first issue of that. Number 17, X-Men number five, still for Marvel. Then DC checks in at number 16 with Green Lantern Corps, number 54. Number 15, Flash, number six, still more Brightest Day tie-ins. At number 14, Uncanny X-Men 530, number 13, Secret Avengers, number seven.

Number 12, Batman, number 704. And at number 11, New Avengers, number six. Then into the top 10 with Batman and Robin, number 17 from DC, Green Lantern, number 59. Amazing Spider-Man, number 648, at number eight. Two issues of Brightest Day cover number seven and six on the list.

At number seven, Brightest Day 14, number six, Brightest Day 13. Batman and Robin back for the number five slot, Batman and Robin number 16. Batman the Return of Bruce Wayne, number six, at number four. Number three, Avengers, number seven. Number two, Batman Incorporated, number one.

And again, the top selling comic for November. From DC, Batman the Return, number one. The point. That does it for this week. Got a lot more in store for you.

In fact, over the weekend, some very cool things in pop culture and more. Rolling right now on The Point Radio, you know you can listen free anytime you want to, 24 hours a day. All it takes is a couple of clicks at GetThePointRadio.com, listen on your computer, your iPhone, your iPad, your droid, whatever it is, we'll get to you one way or another.

In the meantime, this podcast produced twice every week by Malcontent Media and seen on great websites like ComicMix.com and MichaelDavisWorld.com. We're in the iTunes podcast directory under The Point Radio and easy to reach anytime and listen and get the point radio.com. Have a great weekend.

We'll catch you right back here on Monday.