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I wish I were talking about the impending Toronto debut of The Sound of Music stage musical. But this may very well be the farthest from it that it is humanly possible to go.
Yes, it is time once again to talk about The Hills, the deplorably vapid so-called "reality" show that returns to MTV tonight, starting at 8 with a two-hour recap of the previous season (was the entire season even that long?), with the first show of the new one at 10 and the somehow similarly successful homegrown Hills After Show at 11.
Regular readers already know how I feel about this damned thing – admittedly, on the basis of a single screening, which I had to stop partway through when my eyes began to bleed.
I cannot argue, though, the show is absolutely huge, the biggest thing on MTV here and in the U.S., and rapidly becoming an industry unto itself.
It is, I feel, inevitable that it will soon start spinning off into franchised side-series, like CSI and Law & Order and soon even The Office.
As you might imagine, I have a few suggestions:
The Hillsbillies: Lauren and Heidi take their feud to the Ozarks, which becomes even more heated when Heidi dumps Spencer to steal Lauren's new boyfriend, Jethro.
The Hillstons: The Hills gang is officially adopted by Kathy Hilton, so Paris will have someone she can relate to and play with.
The Forest Hills: Lauren's signature clothing collection sells so well at Holt Renfrew that she pulls up stakes and relocates to Toronto, where she and Whitney get jobs interning for Flare.
The Pills: A sequel series set 25 years later, recalling Valley of the Dolls, where the girls have all grown up to become nipped, tucked and Botoxed prescription drug-addicted cougars.
And then, my favourite: The Hills Have Eyes, in which the entire cast is graphically devoured by desert-dwelling mutant psychopaths.
Doubting Thomas ... There's a major misunderstanding re: my column on Saturday that I'd like to clear up right away. I got an email yesterday from the very talented showrunner Rob Thomas – late of the fabulous Veronica Mars – taking understandable umbrage at my suggestion that he was "replaced" on the new 90210 sequel series.
I wasn't wrong, exactly. He was replaced – but only after leaving of his own accord to concentrate on not one but two pilots of his own, which have both already been picked up by ABC.
"The CW asked me to stay on the (90210) project," he clarifies. "But I was contractually bound."
Point taken. I did make it sound involuntary and for that I apologize. Quite frankly, though, I always thought 90210 was a bit unworthy of a man of Thomas's talents. Then again, if anyone could have legitimized and reinvented that well-worn franchise ... alas, we'll never know.
But we do have two very exciting new ABC series to look forward to. And one of them, Good Behavior, stars our own beloved Catherine O'Hara, returning to TV to play the matriarch of a criminal clan who decides that it's time for them to go straight.
The other Thomas project is also near and dear to my heart, the revival of Cupid, his 1999 series that starred Jeremy "Entourage" Piven as a man convinced he is the mortal incarnation of the cherubic godling of love, and sets about hooking up couples to earn back his wings, much to the chagrin of his shrink, Paula Marshall.
The original show was axed after a mere 15 episodes, but now Thomas is bringing it back intact with only a change of casting: Emmy winner (for guesting on Will & Grace) Bobby Cannavale and the phenomenal Studio 60 survivor, Sarah Paulson.
Expect to see at least one of them sometime mid-season.
