June 06, 2003

"Did liberal-bashers cost Garofalo her sitcom?"

Unfortunately, it appears that her sitcom "Slice o' Life" has been cancelled:

Is the ghost of Sen. Joe McCarthy alive and well in Hollywood? That is certainly on the minds of many outspoken liberals in Tinsel-town these days. The latest conspiracy theory focuses on the just-announced axing by ABC of very vocal anti-Iraq war activist Janeane Garofalo's new sitcom, ''Slice o' Life...''

[...It was cancelled] just days before the show's pilot was scheduled to be taped in Vancouver, British Columbia.

A source close to Garofalo tells this column the actress and comedian was furious by the last-minute change and believes it's yet another example ''of a network bowing to the perceived power of the Bush administration. ... Janeane is convinced her politics and all the hate mail the right-wing lobby stirred up during the war is what is behind all this.''

An ABC spokeswoman denies that, saying this was a decision based strictly on the artistic merits (or lack thereof) of the show--with Garofalo's politics ''never coming into the decision-making process whatsoever.''

How can there be a conspiracy theory already? There's only four posts at DU.

As for McCarthyism, there's a long but interesting summary of how he was "bad news" here. Just because McCarthy might have been a "vicious smear artist" doesn't mean there weren't commies in Hollywood: "The Hollywood angle is different. They were Communists. They lied and dodged the question before the HUAC and the media now claims they were NOT Communists... [links in which they admitted they inserted commie propaganda in scripts, etc.]"

I don't think Garofalo is a Commie or a traitor. She just needs to be sent to the Lonewacko Reeducation Camp.

Posted to Celebrities at June 6, 2003 12:02 AM

Comments

I think 'last place in the ratings ABC' was definitely worried about all the hate mail and boycotters. They couldn't afford to have that kind of attention. Or maybe they should have. Read the script, and it was very funny. The actors for the pilot were all funny. ABC blew it.

Posted by: paul price at June 16, 2003 05:08 PM

I guess we will never know what ABC really did and why.

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Posted by: jamesr at October 30, 2003 11:46 AM