Top 10 Most Anticipated New Shows8. The Beautiful Life (The CW): Here's a hallway conversation that finally made its way onscreen: Take the whopping success of "America's Top Model," add in some male hardbodies, and fictionalize the behind-the-scenes antics. But this program's not over-dramatizing it, or so claims exec producer and persistent Twitterer Ashton Kutcher. Instead, The Beautiful Life aims to tell the real fashion-industry stories that reality TV leaves out. As if art imitating life weren't enough, star Mischa Barton's well-publicized off-screen problems may be a case of life imitating art. In either case, interest has been enough to put the show in the top 10. Premieres Wednesday, 9/16 at 9pm ET on The CW
ReviewI've seen the pilot episode for the new CW show The Beautiful Life and I'm digging it. This article will contain some spoilers for the episode, though I try to be vague about the important plot points.
We open at the Zac Posen show during New York Fashion Week (Mr. Posen himself makes a cameo). Posen seems to be going for an 18th century Victorian look here that’s completely over the top, but I admit that high fashion sometimes confuses me. It’s Raina's (Sara Paxton) first runway show and she’s very overwhelmed, until she steps out there and struts her stuff. Backstage at the show we’re introduced to the other main characters, including the somewhat bitchy Marissa (Ashley Madekwe) and the boys: Isaac (Corbin Bleu), Egan (Jordan Woolley) and Cole (Nico Tortorella).
Mischa Barton is back on television as Sonja Stone, a pill-popping model who is trying to launch a comeback after disappearing off the scene for six months. The other models speculate that she was detoxing in rehab and we all think that as well, until later in the episode. She arrives late at the Posen show and is set to model his signature dress until all hell breaks loose because she’s gained two pounds (yes, TWO WHOLE POUNDS). I know, it’s all very shocking. Posen sends Raina out in the dress and suddenly she’s the new It girl. [...]
There’s something about this show that distinguishes it from the rebooted 90210 and Melrose Place. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I like it. Sure, it may seem like another show staffed with beautiful, rich people, but it’s not as insipid as many other teen dramas these days. The cast is attractive and are decent actors. The characters are interesting and I love taking a peek into the scandalous lives of models. The clothes are gorgeous. I predict producer Ashton Kutcher has a hit and I will most definitely be tuning in every week.
A Closer Look at THE BEAUTIFUL LIFELast year, Mischa Barton passed on the part of bad girl Georgina Sparks on GOSSIP GIRL, but there’s still a chance that she may cross paths with Blair, Chuck and the rest of the gang.
THE BEAUTIFUL LIFE executive producer Mike Kelley, who is “good friends” with GOSSIP producers Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, pitched his idea for a crossover between the two shows at a recent Q&A. It’s not hard to imagine a crossover between the two glitzy, New York-set shows, but the setting for Kelley’s idea is far from glamorous.
“Our cast is on the subway, and their cast is on the subway, and the subway shuts down. We don’t necessarily have to cross them. We can tell two stories with them in the background and maybe have one or two characters cross through,” Kelley described. “Something like that, that would be an event moment. It would have to be really creative. They don’t need us.”
Whether or not Barton will be on GOSSIP GIRL is a mystery, but she will very much be a part of THE BEAUTIFUL LIFE, Kelley and fellow executive producer Karey Burke emphasized.
“We love her. I’ve known her for years,” said Kelley, who worked on THE OC and created SWINGTOWN. “She looks great. Her acting is terrific. Her character is integral to all the stories, so her character is not going anywhere and neither is she.”
“She’s been nothing but a total pro,” Burke added. “Her situation did nothing to stop production or push production. It’s our own fault that we didn’t have our sets ready.”
Despite Barton’s real life health troubles, the producers aren’t taking it easy on her character Sonia in terms of subject matter. Sonia will still have to deal with living in the spotlight, escaping the paparazzi and what looks like a drug problem in the pilot presentation.
Kelley and Burke also cited the benefits of Barton’s modeling connections. Irina Lazareanu, one of Barton’s model friends who just happened to be around on set, cameos in the pilot as the first model in the Zac Posen show. Other famous faces appearing on the show include PROJECT RUNWAY judge Nina Garcia, designer Matthew Williamson and models Erin Fetherston and Jessica Stam. The show was also able to get a Versace dress for the pilot and a future episode will film inside Calvin Klein’s offices as the models shoot a Calvin Klein Jeans billboard for Times Square.
Expanding upon the pilot presentation,THE BEAUTIFUL LIFE pilot will add a fashion shoot and the introduction of Corbin Bleu’s storyline, who went from guest in the pilot to series regular. Bleu’s model/musician will no longer have a drug problem, but will instead enter a “kept boy” relationship with a powerful, older woman (Jaime Murray), trading sex for work.
Kelley also teased that “one of the characters that you think is probably going to be a regular on the show gets ousted, but will return.”
As the series goes on, it will explore the body issues that male models must face and might feature an appearance from executive producer Ashton Kutcher, but it’s much more likely that Kutcher will direct an episode rather than appear onscreen. And although Tyra Banks is already doing an arc on GOSSIP GIRL, she has an “open invitation.”
Meanwhile, Elle Macpherson, who plays the head of the Covet Modeling Agency, is on for the first seven of the series’ 13-episode order. Her storyline will intertwined with Sonia’s personal life in a surprising way.
And if THE BEAUTIFUL LIFE sounds familiar, it might be because Kelley has enlisted SWINGTOWN and 90210 composer Liz Phair to score the series. [thetvaddict.com]
Mischa Barton Back on the Party Scene Days After Being Released From HospitalMischa Barton's proving that you can take the party out of the girl, but you can't take the girl out of the party.
Just days after getting released from her forced hospitalization on July 15, Barton was spotted Sunday night at NYC's All Points West festival.
And the former "OC" starlet certainly wasn't making any effort to fly under the radar.
Instead, she paired a black, strappy, backless minidress with hot pink and black Christian Louboutin stilettos, as she partied alongside DJ Daisy Lowe and designer Richie Rich, the Daily Mail reports.
It's a curious return to the party scene for a girl who has spent most of her time recently in "involuntary psychiatric hold."
Upon getting sprung from her stay, she immediately dove back into work filming the new TV series The Beautiful Life, in which she, curiously, plays a model-turned-drug addict.
But just because she was out and about doesn't mean she was up to her old tricks.
Sources told RadarOnline that the 23-year-old actress drank only water and smoked cigarettes while she listened to an acoustic set by Peter Bjorn at the Cooper Square Hotel.
During the party, Barton told OK! Magazine, "I'm feeling great. I'm really happy," and even made an early exit to go home and watch HBO's "True Blood."
She told the mag that The Beautiful Life is "going really well…I'm excited," and her costars seem to agree.
Actress Sara Paxton told People, "We had our first read-through and we're all so very excited to have her back. She's such a great girl. We really didn't talk about everything that's been going on. It was really all work."
Filming for the upcoming CW series, which also stars Elle MacPherson and Corbin Bleu, was put on hold while Barton was still being treated in Los Angeles.
TBL Online - blog
"Beautiful Life" Ends After Two Episodes
[Yahoo.com - 09.25.09]
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - After only two episodes, Ashton Kutcher's scripted drama "The Beautiful Life" has become the first victim of the new fall season.
The CW has canceled the show, which starred Mischa Barton as one of a group of models sharing living quarters in New York. It was created by Kutcher and Adam Giaudrone.
Wednesday's episode was seen by just 1 million viewers. END
Kutcher’s ‘Beautiful Life’ Moves to YouTube[NYTimes.com - Dec.17/09]
ASHTON Kutcher is reviving his failed TV show, “The Beautiful Life,” on YouTube.
The actor and producer published three episodes of the short-lived CW show online Wednesday. Only two of them were shown on TV before the show was canceled. Low ratings were to blame: it attracted just 1.4 million viewers on its premiere date and a meager 1.1 million viewers the following week.
Mr. Kutcher, who produced the show, hopes it can find a bigger audience online. He’s been promoting it to his four million Twitter followers. Two other unaired episodes will bow on Monday.
“So here’s what happened,” Mr. Kutcher said in a YouTube video explaining the revival. “We put the show on TV. It went for two episodes. Nobody knew it was on. And so the rating on the TV wasn’t happening.”
“I was like, listen, if we put this thing on the Web, more than half a million people will watch it on the Web. So my feeling is, I want this to be the first show ever that gets more viewers on the Web than what it got on terrestrial television.”
For the parties involved, it is an inexpensive experiment. The episodes are running on YouTube without ads, but the site’s channel for the show is sponsored by HP.
Talking to Reuters, Mr. Kutcher said, “What we feel like we’re doing is creating, in some ways, an industry first. A show that couldn’t find its legs on television, we believe can find its legs on the Web.” END
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Kutcher is determined to bring the show back. It helps that he's more connected than the average producer, and those connections have given The Beautiful Life another shot at, well, life. With some funding from Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) and distribution help from YouTube (GOOG), Kutchers Katalyst Media plans to post a total of five episodes of The Beautiful Life online and keep them there for six months. If the show draws enough engaged viewers, it could live on either as an online-only show or back on TV.
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