The Police were one of the biggest bands of the early ’80s, but they never saw the ’90s as one. Tonight at 8p, Reelz follows their career from their start in 1977, the unbelievable rise to fame and what ultimately led to Breaking The Band.
Stewart Copeland was an established musician thanks to his brother Miles, who was one of the biggest managers of the time. The drummer was touring England when he met a school teacher named Sting. The two exchanged phone numbers and eventually formed the band with a third member.
That third member was not Andy Summers. He joined the band later on and The Police was born.
At first, they were worked well together, but then their egos got in the way. It got so bad they could not all be in the studio to record together. In fact, at one point Sting, buried one of Summers’ demos.
By the time their final album Synchronicity came out, the writing was on the primary color wall. Playing Shea Stadium should have been a happy time for the trio. Instead, it was the realization it was over. After a few more dates, they parted ways for 20 years.
Then they reunited for one more world tour, but the friction was still there.
Now, they each have their own careers, but nothing they will ever do will top what they did as The Police.
I thought I knew a lot about the band, but I learned a lot about them I didn’t know. It is amazing that three guys who made such beautiful music together did not have a beautiful relationship.
Tonight at 9p, Reelz debuts the new series The Price of Fame and you will be instantly hooked. It is a docuseries of how celebrities lives are ruined by fame. The 2-episode premiere looks into how fame changes Heather Locklear and the Diff’rent Strokes kids.
In each episode, they will interview people who knew the actors and people who know about them. They will also do reenactments of their lives, so we can see what their lives were like as they were paying the price.
At 9p, Heather Locklear was a shy, awkward high school student who joined the drama club to be braver. By the time she goes to UCLA to study psychology, she is no longer shy or awkward. Her friends tell her to take some acting classes and she is discovered by an agent.
After several commercials and guest roles, she is convinced to drop out of school. While starring in the movie Twirl, Aaron Spelling notices her and asks her to audition for Dynasty. As we know she gets the role. She an instant star, but not an actress. She has to take acting classes even though she is on one of TV’s biggest shows.
Spelling loved her so much, he cast her on TJ Hooker. Now she is doing two TV shows at once, dating rocker Tommy Lee and getting movie roles. She marries Lee, her shows get cancelled and her movie career stalls.
Her marriage falls apart and she starts dating Richie Sambora. They get married and have a daughter together. She lands a part on Spin City and befriends Denise Richards who was dating her co-star Charlie Sheen. The two women become best friends until there are rumors Richards is having an affair with Sambora. While he is on tour, she files for divorce without telling him.
At this point, nothing goes right for and she spends the next several years in and out of jail and rehab. Something that still troubles her until this day.
At 10p, one of the saddest cases of fame is the stories of the kids from Diff’rent Strokes. They were three normal kids whose lives would change because they were on the sitcom.
However, they had their own issues outside of the show. Dana Plato’s father left her and her mom is in the hospital with a terminal disease. She just wants to be loved. Something she will find at 19 with a guy. They elope and she gets pregnant. That image will not work for the show, so they fire her.
The show was Gary Coleman’s show anyway. Much to the dismay or Plato and Todd Bridges. Plato introduced Bridges to drugs and it becomes a habit he cannot break.
Coleman was not a healthy person. He was born with kidney disease and he is receiving dialysis on the set. The disease also stunted his growth and he was sick of playing a child while dealing with his illness and becoming a man.
When the show is finally cancelled, their lives take an even sadder turn. They cannot find work, but they can trouble. Plato moves to Vegas, does a lot of drugs while working minimum wage jobs. She holds up a video store and is arrested for the crime. She tries to get clean and it looks like she does it. When she goes on Howard Stern, he asks her to prove that she is clean. I guess it was too much for her and her death is ruled a suicide.
Todd Bridges as several run-ins with the law and is even accused of murder. He is sentenced to rehab and he gets himself clean. Something he remains to be up until this day as the last surviving member of the cast.
Coleman sued his parents for spending all of his money and wins. However, he is broke. He eventually takes a job as a security guard and is happy doing it. Fans still approach him and he does not want to be a star anymore. One day he loses it and punches a fan. That is just the beginning of his troubles. He marries a woman, they get a divorce but still live together. They did not have a healthy relationship. Then one day, he falls down the step and dies from his injuries.
Someone says on the episode that this could never happen again. They are better provisions on sets so that their lives don’t end up to be such disasters like Plato, Coleman and Bridges. While yes it has not happened again to a whole cast, it is still happening. I guess you can say, it is the price of fame.
Whether you loved or hated Friends, you have to admit it is a phenomenon. Tonight at 9p on Reelz, we learn more about the sitcom on Friends: Behind Closed Doors. Throughout the two hour episode, we will hear from people who worked on the show, journalistic fans, and the original cast from old interviews. They will tell stories we have never heard, share details that will shock you and answer so many questions you did not know you wanted the answer to.
They will tell us how they cast all six friends. Who auditioned for Monica and Chandler and did not get the role? They wanted Jennifer Aniston for Monica and Courteney Cox for Rachel. Both actresses convinced them to do otherwise. Who came in with an injured nose? Which actress came close to playing Rachel but did not get the part because she was pregnant? Who went up to then-President of the NBC, Warren Littlefield, just before Friends and asked if it is ever going to happen to her? Which actors had other commitments? One was committed to a pilot that did not get picked up. While one of the actresses was on another show at the time and the other network would not let her go. Therefore, NBC screwed with CBS to make sure that show got cancelled. How? You have to watch to find out.
The network thought the cast was too young, so they wanted to add a seventh friend who was older. They thought a cop buddy would help bring in the older audience. The creators did not like that, so they added their parents instead. Which actress started on the show 2 days after giving birth? She literally got home from the hospital with her son and they asked her to be on the set the next day. She was not stupid, she agreed to do it. Lauren Tom, who played Ross’ girlfriend Julie, says the live audience booed her when they filmed her scenes. While she got booed, which scene got the most applauds?
Did you know season 8 was supposed to be its last? What made them agree to do a ninth season? Did you know Matthew Perry and Julia Roberts briefly dated around the time she appeared on the show? What storyline did the cast hate? Hint we hated it too.
These are just a few of the many things you will learn on this special. Fans of the show, and people like me who are so over it, will enjoy it. Whether you watched every episode or if you just heard of it, you will enjoy it because it gives you insight into how a show like this comes about.
In 2011, Reelz gave us The Kennedys and tonight at 9p, they continue their sad, cursed story in The Kennedys – After Camelot.
In June 1968, Robert F Kennedy was running for President and it looked like he was going to be the second Kennedy in the White House. A bullet cut that dream short. His wife, holds a vigil of his brain dead body refusing to pull the plug. Edward Kennedy (Matthew Perry) does everything in his power to try to get her do it, but he to cannot do it. Finally, Jackie Kennedy (Katie Holmes) is asked to do it and she does. I did not know that part of the story, so I Googled it to find out that is really what happened. The first many new things I learned about The Kennedys from this two part miniseries.
Now, that Bobby is dead. The only way for Camelot to continue is if Teddy takes his place and runs for President. He is not ready and his family is not ready for him to do it. Therefore, he decides not the run.
Meanwhile, Jackie is dating Aristotle Onassis and things are getting serious between them. He wants to marry her and he asks The Kennedys for their permission. While he asked her family, he didn’t ask his own and they don’t like her. They think she is just after his money. The married couple now spend time going back and forth between the US and Greece.
Back, in The States Ted Kennedy is married, but not faithfully. One night he meets Mary Jo Kopechne in Chappaquiddick and gives her ride back to the hotel even though he is drunk. His drives the car off of a bridge into the water and channel. She does not. He goes back to the hotel leaving her in the car. Everything he does next will destroy his Presidential dreams and haunt him the rest of his life.
The first part of the miniseries ends tonight with Teddy getting his wife to make a call to Mary Jo Kopechne’s parents trying to stop the autopsy and preserve his future. Next week, After Camelot concludes with how his whole life was ruined because of that night. While Jackie realizes the true love of her life was always her son.
What makes The Kennedys – After Camelot so intriguing, is this is not the story that is normally told about the Kennedys, usually it is only about the rise and falls to a bullet of John F Kennedy and his brother Bobby. The miniseries shows us how hard surviving the ’60s was for the Kennedys. It was even harder than losing two of them to assassinations. Because of that you want to see how Camelot really ended due to cancers and a plane crash.
Reelz announced today that the 4-hour 2-part sequel to their huge hit The Kennedys will air on April 2nd and April 9th and I can’t wait to see it.
We have seen the love story of Jackie and John F Kennedy told many different ways, but this is the story of her life and her in-laws’ lives after JFK was shot and killed on that fateful day. As we know, Jackie married again to a billionaire and it wasn’t a happy one. Her son finally found love after his mother died and shortly afterwards he joined her up in heaven. Then there are The Kennedys, Robert F Kennedy was assassinated while running for President in 1968 and that is where this story begins. His younger brother Ted never got to hold that office after he was involved in a scandal that he never recovered from.
When John F Kennedy was assassinated on November 23, 1963, the family’s legacy went down with him. This is that story and it needs to be told. I can’t think of anyone better to tell it than Katie Holmes reprising her role of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Matthew Perry joining the sequel as her brother-in-law Ted Kennedy.
