Friday 25 February 2011

Hollywood Babble On & On #684: Inevitabilities & Consequences

Welcome to the show folks...

It looks like Charlie Sheen has finally found the line he had to cross to get in deep enough shit that not even his bloated head can float out of it. His recent antics, and feuding with producer, studio, and network has gotten his hit sitcom Two & A Half Men canceled for the rest of the season, and highly unlikely to come back next season.

I've written about Chuckles Sheen before, but if you're too lazy to click the link I'll sum it up for you.

The only thing that's kept Charlie Sheen viable as an actor and TV star are expectations. People have very low expectations of Charlie Sheen. He was known as a drug addled, sex obsessed screw-up even before he became a movie or TV star.

Scandal destroys a career when the audience is disappointed by the star's behavior. Sheen inoculated himself from disappointment by making just showing up for work wearing pants look like a tremendous achievement.

However, when your behavior goes from scandalous to bat-shit insane, you've crossed that precious line. This means that you don't have to worry about the disappointment of the audience ruining your chances for employment, but the reasonable expectation of your co-workers that you're going to drive an SUV through the studio wall, firing pistols, and screaming that you're Lizard King.

What lead to this sad and inevitable conclusion?

Consequences.

Or to be more exact, the lack of consequences.

Sheen's never really had to pay any price beyond the hourly rate for his favorite whores. He's never suffered any consequences of any consequence.

Even now he's coasting. Sure, his show is canned, and he's not going to be paid for the rest of this season, but this only comes after raking in tens of millions of dollars a year in both salary and royalties. He's dumped, but he's been dumped into a vat full of money, so I don't see any real change in his behavior.

What I do see is that the people who worked on Two & A Half Men are now unemployed, and I have the sneaking suspicion that Mr. Sheen really doesn't give a royal shit.

So I advise that the people from that show wash their hands of Mr. Sheen, and come up with another show for the cast and crew to do without him. He doesn't care about them, so they should stop caring about him.

My suggestion: A show where Jon Cryer plays a rich spoiled actor with no impulse control and the Angus T. Jones as his neglected child who tries to live a normal life despite the drug and sex mad antics of his dad. End every episode with the drug-addled dad landing face first in manure, and you've got a hit.

1 comment:

  1. The biggest losers of Chuckles meltdowns are the hourly crew people who work on the show and need the steady paycheck. These assholes all fly in the G3 and then act like the care for all those poor union employees in Madison WI. Fact is they do not give a shit when the other union employees who operate the cameras, work the wardrobe and make up department and sound boards are out of work because they show gets cancelled.
    This is why Sonny with a Chance was retooled without Demi when she went into treatment, so all those crew and techies can still work. unlike Chucky, Demi at 18 is taking her treatment seriously. Which is more mature than Sheen ever will.

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