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"You really are clueless, an embarrassment to the name. Hope you're adopted." -- June Dever
"this guy is right about conserving a clue. he hasn't one and that leaves more for the rest of us." -- Jim Lovell
"Your e-mail addy... should be 'dever@getalife.net.'" -- Sponge
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| David Caruso Wants to Kick Your Ass |
| Posted by: dever on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 - 11:55 PM |
In the late 70s and early 80s, attempting to feed off of the "macho" image Miller Brewing Company was working to instill in to its "Lite" brand, the folks over at Schlitz decided the key to their prosperity was to out-Miller their cross-town rivals. After compiling a crew of even meatier meatheads than the crew of washed-out, has-been athletes Miller had found, they produced their own series of ads in which their tough guy would be asked to trade his beer for another. At this point he would snarl at the camera and exclaim, "What? You want to take away my gusto?!" The end result was a series of commericals which were menacing, aggressive, and literally scared off potential Schlitz drinkers. Marketing insiders aptly took to calling the campaign, "Drink Schlitz or I'll kill you!"
Apparently, those same writers have moved on from the advertising firm they were at and are today writing for CSI: Miami. And it is getting old...
The show is centered around giving Caruso ample opportunities to preen and show off that he's the baddest dude in Miami. Apply this formula to any given week's episode:
Person Dies. Caruso and crew arrive on scene, make witty banter and wrap up with Caruso making some inane comment that, I can only assume, is supposed to convey a sense of urgency - punctuated by Caruso putting on his sunglasses. ** Title Sequence ** Random beautiful people collecting evidence ** Caruso standing in a hallway, leg jutting in some sort of male-model-wannabe pose, staring out a window doing absolutely nothing for 3 seconds. Person approaches Caruso in conversation, during which he refuses to look the person in the eye and scowls. Concludes with Caruso finally lifting his head and intimidating said person. ** Random beautiful people in lab coats playing with cool geeky toys - edited as annoyingly as possible by some wanna-be Tarantino with multiple frames of action moving around, goofy image effects, and a hip-yet-relatively-unknown artist for a background score like Baxter, or Massive Attack. ** Caruso heads out and confronts head bad-guy number one, softly threating him while looking at the deck, punctuated when he looks in to his adversary's eyes and lays out the overt threat. This is another favorite spot for Caruso to put on his sunglasses again. ** Random beautiful people in lab coats.... well, you get the picture already.
I don't want to be too hard on the writers, I understand that Caruso isn't the easiest guy in Hollywood to write for. While some actors have a range of emotions and temperments they can credibly portray, others have fewer dimentions. Caruso has an on and off switch - he's either talking or he's silent. His sunglasses are on or they are off. He's looking at the floor or at the camera.
The end result is something that feels so fake and is so over-the-top is trying to make Caruso tough that it ends up as a giant joke. It's "Drink Schlitz or David Caruso will kill you!"
As an aside, I've taken to watching the show with a bottle of Scotch and making my own drinking game out of it. Not only is the show much more enjoyable, I'm usually feeling pretty good by the end of it. Anyone who wants the rules, feel free to ask.
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