Evans Above

Last year for the May sweeps period, Entertainment Tonight covered the Mary Kay Letourneau and Vili Fualaau wedding.

This year, both ET and its even crappier sister show, The Insider, are spending time breaking up “reunion” interviews with Joey Buttafuoco, Mary Jo Buttafuoco and the “Long Island Lolita”, Amy Fisher, into bite-sized morsels they can spread over several episodes.

Again, I have to ask: Isn’t ET supposed to be covering entertainment news? If the three stooges I just mentioned had at one time been actors or industry figures, then perhaps this attention would make some sense. The fact that ET’s paying them for these interviews really shows how far they’ll stoop for ratings.

Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush, who has a blog over at their site finds ET kinda distasteful as well. The guy’s an enjoyable read. He knows the arena he’s in can be goofy and trivial and will even call himself out when he thinks Access has taken themselves too seriously.

I’ll talk more about this later, but if you get a chance, see the Al Gore documentary about global warming, An Inconvenient Truth. If you don’t buy a hybrid after seeing it, there’s got to be something wrong.

Votefortheworst.com has gathered together various sources to show that American Idol’s Kellie Pickler is doing a fine acting job playing the hick.

I don’t know why some people think Larry King is a great interviewer. He’s often clueless and he keep s on interrupting people.

The TV’s on in the other room and I can hear a repeat of his interview with Liza Minnelli. He asks her what it was like performing Cabaret night after night.

KING: “Cabaret” that had to be incredible doing that every night.

MINNELLI: Well, that was, I’m telling you it was quite a wonderful time and I’m so lucky that I have almost perfect recall, which is wonderful. I have a good memory and I remember every second of that show.

KING: Did you enjoy it every night?

MINNELLI: Well, we only did that show [Liza with a “Z”] once, one time, in front of an audience and that was when it was filmed and it had, you know, we had 16 dancers. We had everything. Then I went back out on the road with only four dancers and did a whole different show and whatever, you know.

KING: Oh.

She made the movie, Larry, she was never in the Broadway show.

This week’s eliminated American Idol contestant, Kevin Covais, had to have the dumb comment of the week. Asked by Ryan “Could I be more annoying?” Seacrest for his parting words, he said, “America, be smart. Pick one of these amazing people.”

Yo, Kevin! There aren’t any write-in candidates. Who do you think they’re going to vote for instead?

I also love how the show keeps talking to “America”. If 30 million people are watching, that’s only a bit over 10% of the population. That means, say, 85% of the U.S. couldn’t give a rats ass about you.

I’m currently backstage in the press room, getting ready for our live blogging of the ceremony. Best thing about being here: the food.

Join us for our live coverage and the red carpet photos we’ll have later.

We’re in LA for the Oscars. After a visit to the Farmers’ Market, we were heading up Highland. Suddenly, we spotted Joey Fatone giving a hug to Kevin Federline’s baby momma #1, Shar Jackson.

So much for the C-list.

I forgot to mention the other day that we’ll be off to the Oscars again this year. We’ve been there since 1999. This year we’ll be on the red carpet and backstage.

Time to press the tuxedo.

We’re in LA this week to cover the SAG Awards. Just before grabbing a bite at the Hamburger Hamlet opposite the Kodak Theatre, we saw ex-American Idol contestant Corey Clark standing on the sidewalk. He had two posters for his new CD wrapped around him and he was handing out pamphlets.

Most of the people walking by didn’t seem to notice him. So much for his publicity-grabbing accusations about Paula Abdul.

“I’m not smart enough to debate you point to point on this but I have the feeling about 60% of what you say is crap.” – David Letterman to Bill O’Reilly 1/3/06

I really need a PVR. That way, I could set and forget a whole bunch of shows I enjoy, check ‘em out and then zap ‘em. Last night, I came in part way through David Letterman‘s interview with Bill O’Reilly. Letterman kept challenging him on his “destruction of Christmas” crusade but the real heat happened when the two turned their remarks to the Iraq war. One exchange:

Letterman: “How can you possibly take exception with the motivation and the position of someone like Cindy Sheehan?”

O’Reilly: “Because I think she’s run by far-left elements in this country. I feel bad for the woman.”

Letterman: “Have you lost family members in armed conflict?”

O’Reilly: “No, I have not.”

Letterman: “Well, then you can hardly speak for her, can you?”

Searching the blogosphere on this exchange only shows how divided the U.S. is into liberal/conservative camps. Doesn’t anyone down there have centrist views?