Results tagged “hbo”

An HBO drama called "Gentlemen of Leisure," based off of the 1999 documentary "American Pimp," wants to film in and take place in Oakland. But not so fast, says Mayor Ron Dellums. While the production might give Oakland an economic lift when/if it starts filming next year -- and be handed loads of blind praise by male critics who hoover this kind of shit up the way they do with cocaine and reruns -- Dellums isn't thrilled about further promoting the whoreriffic image the East Bay city already has. According to Dellums' chief of staff, David Chai, "While the mayor understands that there are certain benefits to having a major film project in our city, he is not willing to support this project at this time. The people of Oakland have come too far to have our city's name trampled upon in the name of entertainment." And, in many ways, he's absolutely right.

HBO bought the rights to Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO and the Steroids Scandal That Rocked Professional Sport, the infamous book penned by Chronicle reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams. According to a sister over at Variety, in it Bonds is "painted in 'Game of Shadows' as a gifted player who made a Faustian bargain to increase his power." (Might we suggest Damn Giants as a working title, then?) Ron Shelton -- auteur...

After last week's dueling press conferences and memo-leakage, the Homeless issue is becoming the Issue du Jour, leading to a full-fledged reporter dogpile. First came CW Nevius who weighed in with yet another story on the issue, this time saying that even in liberal, tolerant, San Francisco, residents might not be feeling so liberal and tolerant when it comes to dealing with the homeless. As evidence, he points to one of those online polls SFGate ran about the issue in which 90% of the people said they wanted something to be done. We, as a rule, hate those "polls" because it's actual scientific value is nil as it's all determined by people who were motivated enough to play along and doesn’t factor in those who were too lazy to.

Here's todays sports news

Barry didn't play last night due to his legs being shot from playing Tuesday's 13 inning birthday game, thus disappointing a sold out stadium, Bud Selig, and scores of press from around the world who instead got stuck watching a very good pitching duel and Noah Lowry solidifying his role of staff ace. Maybe Bud Selig should institute some sort of "best interest of baseball" rule saying that if Barry isn't going to play, the Giants should announce it first thing in the morning so fans know they don't have to go, Bud can have a nice night out in the town, and all the press hordes can either go home or just hang out in the press booth and get drunk.

Holy smokes! Giant fish on the MTA, Paris Hilton in jail, then out, then in again, Al Gore, goatses, blumpkins, Matt Damon, and baby art critics! It's been a busy week across the Ist-A-Verse, and here's a smattering of what's been going on.

Yesterday, the 415 twosome, the only one's actually charged with anything, met up in court to once again enter their pleas. This time around, the second member of the 415 Gang, Brian Dwyer entered a plea of not guilty to charges he kicked the living sh-- out of one of the Yalies. The kid, Brian Dwyer, is charged with assault and battery and if found guilty and if actually sent to jail for all of this, could face seven years in prison. Yikes-- if we were Dwyer, we'd be totally freaked out right about now as this all came from one bad, drunken decision. The other one, Richard Aicardi, entered his plea of not guilty on March 8th.

We've always wondered what would happen if there was a power outage somewhere in Silicon Valley. Would the stock market crash? Would we not be able to surf porn? Would we no longer be able to download "Buffy" reruns over iTunes? Well, we're about to find out as there's a blackout in one of the hearts of Silicon Valley, that being San Mateo County.

OK, so maybe we’re a little addicted to crime dramas, but when we finally rented HBO’s acclaimed Paradise Lost documentaries last year they literally changed our life. We’ve been following the plight of the West Memphis Three ever since.

was nominated for an Oscar, is familiar with the festival circuit where lesser known players are shuttled from hotel room to screenings without ever making contact with festival organizers. He declared that SFIFF festival organizers made him feel like family. The audience was rooting for him even more after that.

We were amazed as heck that the folks from the High Times Comedy Festival emailed us instead of SFist Jackson, and even more surprised that they offered us tickets to giveaway to some lucky readers to attend Saturday's 10:15 p.m. show of their Fest at Cobb's Comedy Club.

In the past month we managed to catch up on two seasons of "Battlestar Galctica" (yes, we listened to our dear readers and got good and hooked) including the season finale, and now it's all over and we have to wait until OCTOBER for new episodes. Sheesh. Maybe we should have savored those DVDs instead of devoring them like the gluttons we are.

A couple of months ago, Randy Moss admitted to Bryant Gumbel on HBO's "Real Sports" (a great, underrated show, by the way) that he sometimes, every once in awhile, liked to smoke a little reefer. He didn't say he still does, or he does during the season, or even that he does gravity bongs with Snoop Dog and Donald Rumsfield at after-game parites. He just said that he "likes to have fun." Granted, in these days, it's not a big deal unless the athelete is injecting somebody in the ass, but it'’s not often your big, NFL superstar admits to smoking.

The end of HBO's drama "Six Feet Under" is this week's most notable television event, and at first we were a little ambivalent about it. (Warning to anyone who is planning on catching up on the series on DVD, thar be spoilers ahead. Although, really, if you haven't heard about what's gone down this season yet, you live in a better bat cave than we do.) We've seen every single episode of the show, and as the seasons progressed, we just got more and more annoyed by those Fishers and friends. How many times did we have to sit through episodes wherein the characters made the same mistakes over and over again? Would these Fishers EVER learn? Would they ever find happiness? Did they even DESERVE happiness after all the chances they got and ultimately screwed up? Have you ever had a friend who always seems to do the wrong thing, even though they are completely aware that they are doing the wrong thing, only to come crying to you about every predicament they are, once again, in? Well, if you have, you know it can be friggin' exhausting. And so was watching "Six Feet Under."

There are two great things about getting to compile this column -- one is the sense of camaraderie and sharing we get when our wonderful SFist colleagues or readers recommend, refer, or concurrently read (Christine, that's you) books from their online reserve list. There are so many books we've read only because we've checked them out, borrowed them, or purchased them from one of our fine local independent bookstores at the behest of a reader or fellow SFist. Y'all are better than the NY Times Book Review. Maybe one day Norman Mailer will crap all over us too.

The first ad-supported gay cable channel is set to hit the airwaves today, but most people in San Francisco won't be able to watch it.

Of course SFist is of the opinion that The Sopranos is the only good thing that's been on television in the last decade or two. Sure, there's stuff that's entertaining all over TV -- but in more of a "can't turn away from the impending trainwreck" way than a "oh my God, the artistry!" kind of way. But airing after the Sopranos last season was a show called Deadwood, which told the tale of Wild Bill Hickock's death in a territorial mining camp in South Dakota. The screenwriting is incredibly salacious, with sex, drugs and murder abounding in every episode. And we love it!

Postcards From Buster is about Buster's adventures travelling to real places and meeting real people. And no, we don't think it's because he should have made a left at Albuquerque, it's because he's trying to show all the kiddies out there all the different types of people and religions out there. Let's see Pokemon try and do that!