Licking and Salting War's Open Wounds
By ALLISON HOPE WEINER, The New York Times, Published: July 25, 2005
LOS ANGELES, July 24 - This show doesn't have a lawyer plunging to her death down an elevator shaft. It doesn't have a foul-mouthed cop making broadcasting history by mooning more than 20 million viewers. What it does have - and what makes it unmistakably a Steven Bochco production - is plenty of button-pushing. It's called "Over There," and it's a television drama that takes direct aim at the single most polarizing subject in the United States right now: the war in Iraq.
Mr. Bochco's show, making its debut on Wednesday night at 10 on the FX cable channel, tracks a squad of eight young American soldiers (played mostly by unknowns like Josh Henderson, Luke MacFarlane and Lizette Carrion) as they battle insurgents in the blazing deserts outside Baghdad (actually, it the show is shot outside Los Angeles, near Lancaster, Calif.) while their families wrestle with their own challenges at home. Mr. Bochco pointedly avoids plotlines about the politics of this war; most center on more intimate human dramas, like one black soldier's distrust of authority and his white superiors. The show is bound to shock and awe viewers just the same.
NOTE: More early coverage of 'Over There.'
LOS ANGELES, July 24 - This show doesn't have a lawyer plunging to her death down an elevator shaft. It doesn't have a foul-mouthed cop making broadcasting history by mooning more than 20 million viewers. What it does have - and what makes it unmistakably a Steven Bochco production - is plenty of button-pushing. It's called "Over There," and it's a television drama that takes direct aim at the single most polarizing subject in the United States right now: the war in Iraq.
Mr. Bochco's show, making its debut on Wednesday night at 10 on the FX cable channel, tracks a squad of eight young American soldiers (played mostly by unknowns like Josh Henderson, Luke MacFarlane and Lizette Carrion) as they battle insurgents in the blazing deserts outside Baghdad (actually, it the show is shot outside Los Angeles, near Lancaster, Calif.) while their families wrestle with their own challenges at home. Mr. Bochco pointedly avoids plotlines about the politics of this war; most center on more intimate human dramas, like one black soldier's distrust of authority and his white superiors. The show is bound to shock and awe viewers just the same.
NOTE: More early coverage of 'Over There.'
- "Baghdad blues: Over There," Steven Bochco's new American-troops-in-Iraq series, uneasily walks a difficult line — just like its characters." By Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer, July 27, 2005.
- "The Drama of Iraq, While it Still Rages," By ALESSANDRA STANLEY, The New York Times, July 27, 2005.
- "Bringing It Home: The Honesty and Tension Of FX's 'Over There' Compensate for Its Flaws." By Tom ShalesWashington Post Staff Writer, July 27, 2005; Page C01
posted by Gordon Stables | 10:33 PM
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