Notes From D. R.

The Life Of Reilly

Veteran actor Charles Nelson Reilly passes away at 76.

That's Entertainment

Veteran actress Yvonne De Carlo passes away at 84.

Performance

The New York Times profiles actress and pro-life activist Patricia Heaton.

Wrestling With Shadows

How does one explain the decline in popularity of professional wrestling in the United States?

In the late 1990s it appeared that the so-called "sports entertainment" industry was an unstoppable financial force. Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Entertainment and Time Warner's World Championship Wrestling grossed millions from pay-per-views, live event ticket sales, and merchandise. The competition between the two companies drove the industry to economic achievements even greater than that experienced during McMahon's early years as head of WWE, during which he promoted Hulk Hogan as his top star.

As this decade began, the wrestling boom became a bust. WCW fell victim to chronic mismanagement (including an inexplicable unwillingness to promote younger stars to replace aging veterans such as Hogan and Randy Savage) and fell deep into debt; in March 2001, Time Warner pulled the plug on WCW, selling the corporate name and tape library to McMahon. Vince was handed a golden opportunity to create a simulated WWE vs. WCW feud within his own company, but he refused to spend the millions of dollars necessary to buy out the contracts of major-name WCW wrestlers (who were actually still under contract to Time Warner) and produced a "feud" featuring WWE main-eventers competing against second-tier WCW performers. The "feud" was abandoned by the fall of 2001.

In early-2002, McMahon rehired Hogan and '90s stars Kevin Nash and Scott Hall to produce an updated version of the so-called "New World Order" storyline that led WCW to ratings dominance between mid-1996 and mid-1998. While McMahon managed to score a huge payoff with a high-profile March 2002 match pitting Hogan against late-'90s star Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, the attempt to replicate WCW's success with the storyline was a failure, and the whole project was abandoned by the end of the year.

In 2003, WWE dropped the ball again, hiring late-'90s WCW star Bill Goldberg and promptly stripping away everything that made him unique in what was supposedly an attempt to make him a more well-rounded wrestler. Although McMahon scripted him to win the World championship in September 2003, Goldberg's frustration with the company's ill-advised efforts to add "depth" to his wrestling persona reached the boiling point, and he left in March 2004.

Mismanagement has defined the WWE for most of this decade. Instead of allowing new stars to shine, many potential box-office draws have been held back by politics. The company has demonstrated an inability to deal with public-relations problems, such as the fallout from the untimely deaths of stars such as Eddie Guerrero. Top stars such as Shawn Michaels and Paul "Triple H" Levesque are being used in pointless storylines, and supposed "stars of the future" Dave Batista, John Cena and Randy Orton evidently lack the "it factor" that made Hogan, Johnson and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin household names.

Can McMahon turn things around? With top stars such as Kurt Angle having departed for competing promotions, and with other major names such as Paul "Big Show" Wight sidelined by severe injuries, it's hard to tell. On April 1, McMahon will produce WrestleMania 23, which will mark the 20th anniversary of arguably his proudest moment--the 1987 WrestleMania III show in which over 70,000 fans watched Hogan defeat Andre the Giant. Will the show underperform on pay-per-view? Will years of mismanagement finally catch up with McMahon? Or will he somehow find a way to bodyslam the skeptics once again?

The Late Show

Actress Jane Wyatt passes away at 96. 

The First Cut Is The Deepest

9/11 revisionist history.

Your Show Of Shows

Mike Douglas, who hosted a tremendously successful daytime talk show in the 1960s and 1970s, passes away at 81. More from the New York Times and Washington Post.

Spelled Out

Legendary TV producer Aaron Spelling passes away at 83. More from the Washington Post.

Some Of My Best Friends...

Liberal Hollywood reveals its true colors, so to speak...

The Race Card

The increasingly obnoxious Jamie Foxx, celebrating a win at the NAACP Image Awards, tells the audience "It's good to be surrounded by black folks." Could you imagine what would happen if a white entertainer, at an awards ceremony with a predominately Caucasian audience, said that it was "good to be surrounded by white folks?"

Comedy Is Hard

Don Knotts (The Andy Griffith Show) passes away at 81.

Take Cover

Actor Franklin Cover (Tom Willis on The Jeffersons) passes away at 57.

SHARP CRITICISM

Al Sharpton has denounced the Boondocks cable television program for a recent episode depicting Martin Luther King Jr.'s possible reaction to a post-9/11 America. I didn't see the episode, but it doesn't surprise me that series creator Aaron McGruder would go beyond the threshold of good taste, considering what he's been able to get away with in the comic strip that inspired the show.

I've never understood what the fascination was with either McGruder or his strip: like Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo, he has always struck me as a left-wing "humorist" who simply lacks humor. 90% of his strip is mean-spirited crap; the other 10% is just crap. (The same goes for Doonesbury.) It would be one thing if, like Richard Pryor, McGruder could make left-wing points in a manner that makes people of all political persuasions laugh, but McGruder on his best day couldn't touch Pryor on his worst.

When the strip first became popular, much was made of the fact that very few comic strips are geared to black audiences. The problem, of course, is that The Boondocks is itself not geared to black audiences; much like Spike Lee's "joints," his target audience is actually liberal whites. He is held in high esteem not because of his talent, but because of the aggressiveness with which he goes after right-wing figures like George W. Bush and Condi Rice.

You have to admit that there's a certain morbid humor to be derived from seeing two hard-left figures like Sharpton and McGruder brawling with each other. (Also, isn't it interesting that Sharpton can go after McGruder for desecrating the image of MLK, but he hasn't said one word yet about Kanye West's desecration of the image of Jesus Christ?)

McGruder will, of course, survive this current controversy. He is far too valuable to the left to be shunned for his irreverent depiction of MLK; in so many ways, he is more important to the advancement of progressive political goals than Sharpton. Even though he has mocked the memory of King, there's no way the left will ever send McGruder to the boondocks.

Doughnut Hole

Dunkin' Donuts pitchman Michael Vale passes away at 83.

Hell In A Handbasket

Oh, this is just sick. More from the Globe.

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

Dallas star Barbara Bel Geddes passes away at 82.

Final Report

Peter Jennings passes away at 67.

Free At Last

The hosts of the popular cable music show 106 & Park get the Dan Rather treatment.

Beam Him Up

Star Trek actor James Doohan passes away at 85.