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Letterman's (And Our) Longtime 'Bud'

Larry "Bud" Melman is gone. But he was only sort of half-there to begin with.

'The Tudors': Buff Henry VIII Finds Minx Amid the Ermine

Henry VIII has usually been portrayed in historical movies as a tubby old glutton given to lechery and treachery. As far as tubbiness goes, it's obvious from the first scenes of "The Tudors," Showtime's new miniseries about the infamous king, that this is a Henry who's been to the gym. There's barely an ounce of blubber on him.

Down To His Last Shot

Tony Soprano almost celebrates his 47th birthday in the slammer, and all because of a gun he dropped in the snow three years earlier. Fortunately for him, fate -- and series creator David Chase -- intervene.

'Entourage': Still, and Very Much, a Player

An angry writer could take the material that goes into each episode of HBO's "Entourage" and make of it a bitter, scathing assault on Hollywood and the rancid values it pumps into America. But "Entourage" is no assault; it's a party, a spree, a picnic on the beach. It's a seductive celebration of excess and indulgence, not a guilty pleasure but a gilt-edged one.

'Thank God,' Eventually It Ends

Okay, who wants to have a few laughs -- great big, hearty, rollicking guffaws?

Fox's 'Drive': It Can't Get There From Here

Tomorrow night's premiere episode of the new Fox series "Drive" is called "The Starting Line." Trust me, fellow citizens of Television Land: The finish line can't come soon enough.

With 11-Part 'Crossroads,' PBS Looks Many Ways

"America at a Crossroads" answers the question "Is there still a purpose for public television?" And the 11-part PBS series replies in the affirmative, because it's hard to imagine another national network that would attempt a project this ambitious, this challenging and this relatively esoteric.

Bad News, Broken Slowly

"I'm Charles Gibson," said the familiar face on the screen. "I wish I could say it's been a good day. It hasn't."

NBC Broadcasts An Eerie Epilogue

As broadcast and cable networks appeared ready to step beyond decent boundaries of saturation and repetition yesterday in their coverage of Monday's shooting rampage at Virginia Tech, the story suddenly turned shocking new corners -- and took on strange new life.

Till Cancellation Do Us Part

NBC's latest experiment in desperation air fare, "The Real Wedding Crashers," is an HD broadcast: Hugely Dumb. The network, which recently celebrated its worst week of prime-time ratings ever, isn't going to climb out of any sewers with this slimy little gutter-dweller.