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Are You Surprised by Forbes's Top-Earning Men in Prime Time?

BuzzSugar — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 10:30:41 -0800

Forbes recently released the list of Prime Time's Top-Earning Men. Who made the cut? In order, they are: Simon Cowell, followed by Donald Trump, Ryan Seacrest, Charlie Sheen, Steve Carell, Howie Mandel, Kiefer Sutherland, Jeff Foxworthy, Hugh Laurie, and at No. 10 (a tie!) David Caruso of CSI: Miami and Patrick Dempsey.

Simon Cowell at No. 1 is a no-brainer, thanks to the unstoppable machine that is American Idol (not to mention all of his other shows). But there are a few names that made me do a double take. Jeff Foxworthy, for instance - who knew that Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader was such a money generator? And where's Jeff Probst? I guess the Survivor franchise doesn't carry as much clout as I thought.

What about you? Other than maybe Simon Cowell at number 1, do you find this list surprising?

Patrick Dempsey to Move From the Hospital to the Bank

BuzzSugar — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:30:24 -0800

Patrick Dempsey is finally breaking out of his romantic comedy pigeonhole - sort of. He's set to star in an untitled heist film, penned by the guys behind The Hangover. Don't get your hopes up to see Dempsey as a bad-boy bank robber, though - he'll be playing a man "caught in the middle of two different robberies at the same bank who tries to protect a bank teller with whom he's secretly in love."

Sounds like it could have potential to be cheesy, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that writers Jon Lucas and Scott Moore can keep the plot line on the edgier side and hit another home run.

Movie Preview: Valentine's Day Starring Everyone

BuzzSugar — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 09:52:36 -0700

By now you've probably seen the myriad on-set shots for the upcoming ensemble romantic comedy Valentine's Day. Oh and by "ensemble", I mean the most star-studded cast to hit Hollywood in years.

This movie has (take a deep breath with me) Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx, Bradley Cooper, Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Emma Roberts, Jennifer Garner, Eric Dane, Patrick Dempsey, Topher Grace, Shirley Maclaine, Ashton Kutcher, Taylor Lautner, and Taylor Swift. Did I miss anyone? Probably.

Put all these beautiful stars in a rom-com, set the trailer to a booming pop song, and you've got me excited. The preview doesn't give a ton of the plot away (though I can make some educated guesses based on the title), or but I'm already analyzing the couplings we see in the clip. Anne Hathaway and Topher Grace? Brilliant. Bradley Cooper and Julia Roberts? I'm not sure about their chemistry, but I guess he does like older women. Zing!

The only question is, with these components, are we looking at He's Just Not That Into You 2.0 or Love Actually 2.0? Or neither? Watch the new trailer and let me know what you think when you read more.

Buzz News Roundup, 7/17

BuzzSugar — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 13:30:36 -0700

Latest Twilight news: Australian actor Xavier Samuel has been cast as Riley, the first new role to be cast for Eclipse. - Hollywood Reporter's Risky Biz
Ed Helms will follow The Hangover by playing a "sad-sack insurance agent" in the comedy Cedar Rapids. - ComingSoon
John Goodman is returning to the small screen for The Station, a new CIA comedy series directed by David Wain and produced by Ben Stiller. - The Hollywood Reporter
The latest Harry Potter movie cast a $104 million spell over worldwide box offices during its first day in theaters, setting a new record. - Reuters
NBC has picked up Persons Unknown, a drama series from Christopher McQuarrie, the Oscar-winning writer of The Usual Suspects. - Reuters
Michael Hirst, creator of The Tudors, has been hired to adapt Bernard Cornwell's best-seller Agincourt, all about Nicholas Hook, the humble archer who fought the French alongside Henry V in 1415. - ComingSoon
Patrick Dempsey will play a race-car driver in a film adaptation of the novel The Art of Racing in the Rain. - Variety
Former Shark actress Sarah Carter has joined the cast of CSI: NY as a regular. - The Hollywood Reporter

Grey's Boys Join Valentine's Day Rom-Com

BuzzSugar — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 11:33:33 -0700

Two handsome McMen of Grey's Anatomy are climbing aboard the already very crowded Garry Marshall rom-com, Valentine's Day. Patrick Dempsey and Eric Dane will join a cast that includes, among others, Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jennifer Garner, Shirley MacLaine, Bradley Cooper and Ashton Kutcher.

The story follows the intersecting love lives of a bunch of LA folks. Dempsey will again be playing a doctor, this time "a married obstetrician dating Garner's character on the sly, with her unaware of his status."

Meanwhile, "Dane will play a quarterback struggling over the decision of whether to retire." Interestingly, though there's no mention of it in today's news piece, the role of the football player has previously been described as a closeted gay character with whom Bradley Cooper's character is in love. I think Cooper and Dane make a pretty cute couple, actually.

Grey's Anatomy Rundown: Episode 23, "Here's to the Future," and Episode 24, "Now or Never"

BuzzSugar — Fri, 15 May 2009 09:30:34 -0700

Grey's Anatomy just wouldn't be the same without an intense season finale. After all, this is the show that had Burke shot, killed Denny, and had Meredith build a house of candles. But even by Grey's standards, Thursday's finale was a doozy. Partially because of the behind-the-scenes drama and partially because of the storylines it set up, we had a lot of questions going into these final two episodes. Were any of them answered? To talk about it, read more.

George might be dying! Izzie might be dying! As the episode fades to black, the two of them are meeting - in an elevator, natch - with Izzie in her pink prom dress and George in his army uniform, while back on earth, their colleagues try furiously to save them. I suppose those of us who wanted answers about whether Katherine Heigl and TR Knight are leaving are out of luck - but wow, what an ending.

Maybe I should have seen it coming, just like last week's wedding. But when George finally managed to sign "007" into Meredith's hand, I screamed. I don't know if it was the twist itself or the the look on Meredith's face, the horror when she sees (and we see) that it's sweet little George there in the bed. George, who's signed up for the army, who saves a total stranger on his way home by throwing himself in front of a bus. He throws himself in front of a bus! And now he's hurt and maybe dying. If he goes out, at least he goes out with an act of kindness - and I'm glad the woman he saved insisted on being with him, because at least he had someone to hold his hand through the pain.

That struggle is the episode's bigger shocker; we knew Izzie's path wouldn't be easy. But I don't think I anticipated how hard it would be for Alex. Should he convince her to have the surgery? Should he let her decide on her own even when she begs for help? And when she comes back, with her long-term memory intact but her short-term recall in pieces, how is he supposed to deal with that? I actually found Izzie's story slow to unravel - until the second half of the second hour, anyway - but several scenes were just heartbreaking, including Alex pushing to get Izzie to remember things. The post-its, the potassium levels - I wanted to shake him, tell him to give her time, but I'm sure he was afraid there wasn't any. It's sad that the only thing she remembers is their fight - but sweet that she remembers anything at all. And yet, just like with Denny, the second you think Izzie's really back, she crashes, and maybe for good.

Speaking for a second of post-its, that's what Meredith and Derek's wedding turns out to be: a little sticky square of paper with vows written and signed. I'm curious to know how the hardcore Mere-Der fans take this, but I thought the whole act was touching (not to mention their actual vows: to love each other even when they hate each other, to never walk out even when they're smelly and senile). Probably they should get around to having an actual legal marriage one of these days, but for now, that post-it is enough for me.

And as for the episode's other great love story: every scene with Cristina and Owen feels so tense I can barely breathe - so I guess I know some semblance of what Cristina's feeling. Talk about hating someone and loving them still: he strangled her, he's horribly damaged, he just told his mom he's back from war, and that's a lot of burden for Cristina - but she still wants Owen. Her tortured "I love you" in the hot vent room is hard to watch, but when she finally marches up and kisses him, it's sweet relief.

So much more to say:

When Bailey cries, I cry, so that scene with her telling the Chief that she's sticking with general surgery because she can't be a single mom starting a new specialty made me lose it. Yes, it might have had more punch if we'd explored her problems with Tucker a bit more this season, but her cry of "we're all scared" is chilling.
Mark has grown up so much! I wish we could have seen more of him with Lexie these past few weeks (I assume Chyler Leigh's pregnancy had something to do with that), but it's good to see him talking about houses and creating his own future.
I hope Arizona's back next season, but I also hope they take her quirk level down just a touch. Wheelie shoes? Fine. Crying in front of authority figures when she's mad? Not fine. But her fight with Callie about George joining the army gave us some insight into her backstory, and I think there's a lot more to do with her.
The story of the patient whose healthy leg gets amputated gets lost in the grand scheme of the two hours, but wow, Zach Gilford is so much less mumbly here than he is on Friday Night Lights.
I'm glad Alex pointed out that Izzie's memory loss is just like that case earlier this season.
How do you imagine the George intervention would have gone down?
Shouldn't Owen and Cristina be meeting someplace without a whapping fan blade?

I could talk about this episode for hours, but I'll turn it over to you now. It's going to be a long Summer with a cliffhanger like that!

Grey's Anatomy Rundown: Episode 22, "What a Difference a Day Makes"

BuzzSugar — Fri, 08 May 2009 09:30:50 -0700

The 100th episode of Grey's Anatomy has all the elements of a classic: there's a big tragedy that brings a lot of the doctors together, a few sweeping speeches, and a wedding that makes me cry despite lots of lapses of logic. It's not my favorite Grey's of the season, but if a measure of a good episode is whether I was a weepy mess by the end, then "What a Difference a Day Makes" is certainly good. Ready to talk about it? Just read more.

I'm the first to admit I should have seen the Izzie/Alex wedding twist coming from a mile away. Meredith and Derek don't actually need a wedding, but Izzie does. She planned it to be exactly the wedding she'd want if only she'd live long enough to have a wedding, and Meredith and Derek (and Alex) ensure that she gets it. Sure, if I look too hard, there's a lot that makes no sense (like Meredith's dress fitting Izzie, or the church being full of Meredith and Derek's guests). But I don't really care, because Izzie gets a moment of happiness in an episode that's full of signs of death, and Alex gets to give that speech about becoming a man. We've watched Alex cope with so much tragedy - and watched Justin Chambers grow so much as an actor through those scenes - that his "I become accountable to you" speech rings true. Really, the biggest reason I want Izzie to live is that poor Alex deserves a break.

Meanwhile, the nice, light-hearted plotline we get to go along with Izzie's predeath wedding is . . . a car crash that kills a bunch of college kids on their way to graduation. Oof. I'm still really enjoying the whole George-as-a-trauma-surgeon story, but I think it's going to be a while before George believes he's cut out for it. Not surprising for a guy who started his career branded 007, he takes it personally when patients die. It's going to take a lot of coaching on Owen's part to get George to believe that saving some people sometimes requires losing others. Also, while it was a little too on the nose, the graduation speech - with the kids being zipped up in body bags - also made me cry. Dammit, Grey's.

I'm a little confused about why Arizona thought the middle of a huge trauma that her girlfriend was running would be the best time to confront Callie about the weirdness of their date. Her whole "So I'm not fun? You can get enough of me?" speech made me want to slap her, and I have to imagine that the only reason Callie didn't is that she was too tired from, you know, saving lives. The resolution was fine - Callie's money troubles are out in the open and she and Arizona have happy, pizza-eating naked time - but wow, Arizona was a pest.

Some other thoughts:

Denny Duquette's appearance didn't bother me much this time around, mostly because Izzie now knows what it means and can talk about it with people. (Though I keep thinking that maybe if she'd realized that hallucinating her dead ex was a Very Bad Thing from the start, we wouldn't be in this situation.) The moment when she asked Denny to please step aside so she could spend some time with her husband was sweet.
Yeah, Katherine Heigl's still pretty bald. (Or, I know, "bald.")
You know what was really making me lose it in the episode? The way Bailey kept almost losing it. When Bailey's crying, you know it's bad. Same with Derek basically giving up on Izzie with "She's one of the good ones."
Love that Derek's wedding present to Meredith is a solo surgery.
Do you think Derek and Meredith will ever actually get married now? I could see them just going to the courthouse - but would it drive you crazy to never see their day or hear their vows?

One more episode till we know better what the Grey's cast will look like next season. What are your hopes for the finale?

Grey's Anatomy Rundown: Episode 21, "No Good at Saying Sorry (One More Chance)"

BuzzSugar — Fri, 01 May 2009 08:30:17 -0700

It's Take Your Family Issues to Work Day on Grey's Anatomy this week, as Izzie, Meredith, and Lexie all have to deal with parents showing up at Seattle Grace unexpectedly and Callie works through family strife of her own after her father's tumultuous visit. Meanwhile, Owen and Cristina attempt to have a normal working relationship, with frustrating results. To chat about it, just read more.

Izzie has never talked much about her family. We know her mom called her Cricket and spent money on psychic hotlines, but that's about it. So it's a little crazy for Izzie's mom to suddenly show up in Seattle, all dressed in too-young clothing and flirting with Alex. Izzie didn't even want her there; that was Bailey's doing, but even someone with a maternal instinct as strong as Bailey's soon realizes she's made a mistake. Izzie's just started to come to terms with her illness; the last thing she needs is for her mother to 1) act like it's no big deal, because after all, that woman with the mole on her privates on Tyra survived, or 2) weep hysterically because Izzie's going to die just like her grandma. I'm a little surprised Bailey was so willing to lie to Robbie, but it did get the job done: Izzie and her mom are just better off "loving each other from a distance."

If only Robbie Stevens had crossed paths with Thatcher Grey! Thatcher turns up at Seattle Grace, sober and working his steps; he's there to make amends for everything he did to make Meredith and Lexie's lives harder. I'm a little surprised Lexie accepts his apology so quickly, but she's also always been the Grey sister who believed in the bonds of family. Meredith's cold reaction doesn't surprise me at all, but I did like seeing her complicated relationship with the Chief finally come to a head. She's been working for years now under the guidance of the man who disrupted her childhood. And he does treat her differently; he's probably both tougher on her and kinder to her than he is with any other doctor. In the end, he, too, is making amends: He saw what Ellis was doing to Meredith, and he chose not to fight. It's only now that he seems to be realizing that if he wasn't going to be a dad to her, nobody was.

Though it didn't get much screen time, I was sucked in by Owen and Cristina's story. The two of them are intense people on their own, and that doubles when they're together, so the tension right now is through the roof. Owen tries to treat her like a casual acquaintance - "take care now" - and has her do menial tasks while George gets the big jobs on the trauma team. And she's mad: "What are you, just a 'choke 'em and forget 'em' kind of guy?" But it's not that at all. What Owen wants to do is say he loves her, and that hurts.

Meanwhile:

The story of the little girl, her mother, and the abusive father gets tied up neatly, but I couldn't help feeling somewhat moved by it anyway. Meredith oversteps her boundaries, bigtime, but given her mindset during this episode, she's not willing to see another child hurt. "Your 6-year-old daughter is stronger than you" can't be an easy (or even appropriate) message to hear, but in this case, it inspires someone to get out of a bad situation.
Callie's reaction to her tree-sitting patient and her buttoned-up sister is interesting: She wishes her family could be screaming at her, but instead she's getting stony silence.
Even though dads never like him, Mark agrees to daddy dinner with Lexie and Thatcher! Even Mark Sloan has to grow up sometime.
Sweetest/saddest scene: Alex describing the food to Izzie for Meredith and Derek's wedding site, then clutching the little stuffed animal Izzie's mom brought while Izzie's wheeled off to surgery.
I wonder if Richard will ever read Ellis's journals.

Just a couple of weeks to go for the season! Do you like how Grey's is going these days?

Grey's Anatomy Rundown: Episode 20, "Sweet Surrender"

BuzzSugar — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 09:30:32 -0700

A whole lot happens on this week's return of Grey's Anatomy. Izzie starts chemo and wants to take her mind off her illness by planning an elaborate wedding for Meredith and Derek. Owen follows up on his promise to get help for his PTSD. Callie's dad comes to visit and isn't too impressed with some of the choices his daughter is making. A bunch of relationships (Mark and Derek's, Izzie and Cristina's, George and Alex's) start to evolve and Bailey gets to be awesome. To chat about it all, just read more.

This episode of Grey's is largely about respect. Izzie doesn't respect her illness; Alex doesn't respect George; Bailey doesn't respect the seriousness of pediatrics. And by the end of the episode, that's all changed.

For the first half of this episode, Izzie's doing everything she can to prove to her friends that she's still the same person she was precancer. I mean, she's overdoing it, clearly, because fake-choking and fake-coding are pretty extreme. But it's actually kind of cute to see her working the "I have cancer; now you must bend to my will" angle. But then chemo takes hold, and suddenly she gets it: she's sick. It's interesting that Cristina is the one who's there for that epiphany - suddenly, the person who liked Izzie least is the one mopping her brow.

How funny is it to see Meredith in some of those poofy wedding dresses? Of course Mere just wants a simple wedding, but she knows the right thing to do for now is to let Izzie get her way. And that's not the only big thing she does in this episode: she also finally accepts Lexie as family. (Now, accepting the Chief as best man, on the other hand? That's a place she's just not willing to go, so it's a good thing Mark and Derek's bromance is back on.)

It's a little jarring to have Callie's dad show up out of nowhere, but his arrival helps us see how far she's come. Loved her response to her dad throwing George against the wall and yelling that he committed adultery ("Who hasn't?") and the way she bravely announced she was dating Arizona. (And thank goodness. I couldn't have taken a whole episode of Callie hiding behind messed-up pronouns - "they're pretty busy because they're a doctor here.") Her dad clearly thinks she's lost it and wants to take her home, to the tune of paying the Chief to transfer Callie to Miami. And she won't have it: he threatens to cut her off from her trust fund if she doesn't obey, so she cuts him off first.

So much more to talk about:

Bailey's pediatrics decision is clearly weighing on her, both because she has to tell her husband what she's doing and because she spends the day doing one of the hardest things anyone could do: holding a dying child. Initially, in her chat with Arizona, she dismisses this; it wasn't medical, she says, and if she wanted to hold a kid she could have spent time with her own son. But Arizona points out something she's been saying from the start: this is a specialty about more than cutting.
George (in an actual storyline!) manages to prove himself as a doctor in this episode. For all his faults, he's good at working under pressure - I mean, he's heart-in-an-elevator guy - and with Owen's help he realizes maybe trauma is his place. It's a tough thing for Alex to see: he doesn't respect George as a person or a doctor, but he has to admit George has a skill he doesn't and may never have.
Chyler Leigh looks so pregnant! I love how they justified it by making Lexie eat all the time.
Owen in therapy is going to be interesting. I'm not sure he believes at all in what he's doing, and yet he has so much repressed that he's got to get it out somehow.
I love Callie ranting in Spanish and Mark telling her he doesn't have time to try to decipher her problems in a language he doesn't understand.

Happy to see Grey's back? Where do you stand now on Izzie living vs. Izzie dying?

TV Tonight: Grey's Anatomy

BuzzSugar — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 10:30:58 -0700

After an extremely satisfying episode followed by an extremely unsatisfying month-long break, Grey's Anatomy returns tonight. I'm curious to see how things at Seattle Grace have changed in the aftermath of Izzie's surgery and Derek's proposal.

One thing's clear from the clips I've seen: Izzie isn't content to just sit in her hospital room and knit. In fact, she's doing something I can definitely appreciate given the wedding planning mania on the Sugar network these days: She's devoting all her energy to planning the perfect wedding for Meredith and Derek. In one of the clips below, she's on the phone talking about dresses and flower arrangements - to the dismay of her doctors, who are afraid she's going to crash at any second. I hope she pulls through, though - we know Izzie can pull off a mean Thanksgiving dinner party, so I can only imagine a wedding she plans would be fantastic. (Also, spoiler alert: At at least one point in this episode, Meredith wears a wedding dress.)

Speaking of weddings - and of Izzie, sort of - Callie's dad is in town, and he wastes no time finding George and giving him a good, old-fashioned dressing-down for ruining his daughter's marriage. Also, Owen attempts to deal with his post-traumatic stress issues, and the war between Mark and Derek doesn't seem to have cooled off any. To check out a couple of clips from the episode, just read more.