Brooklyn band bids to make it big in 'Z-Rock'
A comedy called "Z Rock" is the latest series to occupy that overcrowded TV limbo between reality and freely scripted fiction. (Should we maybe term this genre "freeality"?)
But it comes to us on cable's IFC, a channel for cineastes and other people who know what "cineaste" means, so any series it offers instantly commands more respect than a real-but-make-believe affair from, say, Kathy Griffin or Scott Baio, whose resident networks (Bravo and VH1 respectively) inherently caution a viewer to beware.
The premise of "Z Rock" is simple (not really). Playing themselves (sort of), brothers Paulie Z and David Z as well as friend Joey Cassata comprise the actual Brooklyn-based rock band Z02, which on the series is struggling to make a name for itself, a record deal and money.
These lovable TV characters share a hard-partying, libidinous streak that sometimes sabotages their musical pursuits.
Another source of comedy: To make ends meet, the lads collectively live a second life as the Z Brothers, a Wiggles-style band playing children's birthday parties (and butting heads with their relentless rivals on the kiddie-band circuit, Kidtastic).
Lynne Koplitz plays Dina, high-rev manager of this band with an identity crisis.
On the first episode, Dina has booked the boys for a birthday party hosted by the child of Harry Braunstein (guest star Greg Giraldo), a psychopathic music titan who, if he likes what he hears, could sign the band to a rich contract.
Meanwhile, Joan Rivers guests as Dina's standup comic aunt, who's interested in booking the band as her warmup act.
Can Z02 escape the lucrative world of kiddie gigs (and those kiddies' sexy moms) and land success as true rock gods? "Z Rock" premieres tomorrow at 12.30 a.m.
Other shows to look out for:
¦ From the producer of "Deadliest Catch" and "Ice Road Truckers," TV's booming tough-guy-and-gal genre adds a game-show twist with "America's Toughest Jobs". Described as an extreme competition series, it dares 13 men and women to venture out of their safe, conventional careers to compete in dangerous and demanding jobs like, well, extreme fishing (in the premiere episode) and driving 18-wheelers above the Arctic Circle (on week 2). At the end of each episode, their current boss and co-workers size them up, and contestants who don't make the cut are sent packing. The annual salary of each job will be thrown into the winner's pot until the finale of the 10-episode series, when one surviving rookie will claim it all. "America's Toughest Jobs" premieres on NBC on Monday at 10 p.m.
• "The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency" is back for its fourth season. But there are changes ahead in this reality show. Dickinson, the self-proclaimed "world's first supermodel," has a new business partner. A new business plan to move from commercial to high-fashion clients. New headquarters: no longer a Hollywood storefront but a mansion in the Hollywood hills, complete with a newly designed master bedroom decorated by brother-of-Madonna Christopher Ciccone. Finally, Dickinson has a new scheme for keeping her models-in-training in tow: They will reside in this mansion with her. Season premiere is Tuesday at 11 p.m. on Oxygen.
• The winning design for a new home to go up in Katrina-battered New Orleans will be chosen on this week's "Architecture School". It's the second episode in a six-week documentary series that follows students at Tulane University's School of Architecture as they put their learning to use, and deal with the challenges that result. Tulane offers fourth-year architecture students the opportunity to design and build a low-cost single-family home over the course of the school year. Here's the step-by-step story, one view of the literal rebuilding of New Orleans. It airs on Wednesday at 10 p.m. on Sundance Channel.
• Steve loves his job as a firefighter. But he grieves that he was unable to save the life that most mattered to him: his wife, who died in a car accident. Then his life takes another turn when he pulls Grace, a workaholic author, from an apartment fire. Thanks to her brush with death, Grace finds inspiration for a new project: a firehouse cookbook, full of recipes by Steve and his fellow firefighters. Steve begins a healing process, while Grace reclaims her long-lost joy in living. But her reawakening puts a strain on her relationship with her fiance, a career-obsessed businessman.
Mark Consuelos ("Husband for Hire") and Chandra West ("John From Cincinnati") co-star in "For the Love of Grace," a film romance premiering on the Hallmark Channel at 10 p.m. today. It also stars Corbin Bernsen ("Psych").
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Frazier Moore is a national television columnist for The Associated Press. He can be reached at fmoore(at)ap.org
