30 Rock: Discussion Thread

[KevC1980]

Great episode, and they tied My Name is Earl in the demos..thats just awesome...

[mr. sweet]

I love 30 Rock but this was not that great to me. I did laugh but this show has done better. Glad the ratings have improved.

[Toups]

Funny moments from episode 2.2:

- Werewolf Bar Mitzvah

- Dr. Spaceman's celebrity patients (I noticed the Unabomber, Kenny Rogers and Alf)

- "You do the METH" pamphlet

- Tracey saying "mind grapes" (referencing a season 1 joke!)

- Dot.com listeing/singing "No Ordinary Love"

- Grizz wearing a sweater vest

- Tracey imagining his wife with Kenneth (Ken feeding the turkey leg)....and then the 3-way massage with Grizz

- Jenna: "That's where the Olsen twins got separated!"

- Devon: "I can't handle this much meat." Jack replies, "That's not what I heard."

[Graciecat]

I think this whole season has been great so far. The writing seems even sharper than last season.

And I thought Jack and Jenna were hilarious this week.

"Me want food!"

"But do you want food, Jenna, do you?"

[Sylph]

Today I Am a Werewolf, and the Party's on the Web

By EDWARD WYATT

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 24 — Sometimes the jokes come so fast on "30 Rock" that it takes a TiVo — and repeated use of the rewind button — to get them all.

For much of the last two weeks, on television-related Web sites, blogs and message boards, fans of "30 Rock," the critically acclaimed but ratings-challenged NBC comedy, have been replaying and kvelling over "Werewolf Bar Mitzvah." That six-second sketch imagines a 1980s novelty song and music video recorded by Tracy Jordan, the resident nut job on the show within a show on "30 Rock."

As is frequently the case, explaining a joke robs it of its hilarity, so the curious are perhaps better advised to go to nbc.com/30Rock and watch the video of Episode 202, titled "Jack Gets in the Game." The setup to the joke starts about 9 minutes 20 seconds in.

Robert Carlock, an executive producer of "30 Rock," said he came up with the idea as the writers mulled the breakup of the marriage of Tracy, played by the comedian Tracy Morgan. In the box of detritus that his wife delivers to him is the gold record from his recording of "Werewolf Bar Mitzvah."

Cut to the video — a "Thriller"-like montage of badly made-up werewolves sporting lame disco moves while celebrating a coming-of-age ceremony: "Boys becoming men. Men becoming wolves."

"I imagined that Tracy probably went to a bar mitzvah and thought, "Why are there no bar mitzvah songs playing at this party?'" said Mr. Carlock, who wrote the segment along with Tami Sagher.

It took three days to prepare the set, a combination of a rented spooky backdrop, branches hanging from metal light stands and carved-foam Jewish tombstones. The segment was shot on video — four takes totaling about 15 minutes, Mr. Carlock said — and was intended to look shlocky, "like Tracy was rushing to get it done in time for bar mitzvah season."

It is perhaps telling that the segment, which Mr. Carlock said had drawn more commentary from fellow comedy writers than any previous segments on the show, has largely escaped the notice of NBC's marketing department. The network has tried just about everything to drum up viewers for the show, including the heavily promoted stunt casting of Jerry Seinfeld.

But this week NBC, whose corporate parent, NBC Universal, is starting its own Hulu.com video service with News Corporation next week, ordered the video of "Werewolf Bar Mitzvah" taken down from YouTube.

[Toups]

Werewolf Bar Mitzvah was hilarious!! "Boys becoming men. Men becoming wolves" - gets me every time.

Funniest line from the last episode was when Jack said, "My brother, Tim, fixed NBA games." I can't believe 30 Rock made them brothers. That is so awse.

[Toups]

Funny moments from the latest episode "Rosemary's Baby":

- Jack's imitation of Tracy's "family" had me ROTFLMAO!! Alec Baldwin is a comedic genius!

- Jenna: "If I can't be Monique fat, then I have to be Teri Hatcher thin. Either way, it's funny."

- Tracy to the NBC Therapist: "Who's crazier me or Ann Curry?"

- Liz to Jonathan (you hear this off screen: "Suck it up, nerd!"

- Jack: "Don't ever make me talk to a woman that old again."

- Tracy getting ready to actually *fight* the dog.....that's whole new level to "dog fighting" LMAO!!

- The NBC page off with the N-B-C music

- Pete breaking up the Page off: "The phones are ringing off the hook and Conan doesn't have an audience!"

- Jack to Liz after hearing that she saves her money in a chequing account: "Are you an immigrant?"

- The flashbacks of young Tracy...."You can't go out dressed like that." (that costume was hilarious!) .... "You're not my father." LMAO!!

Best episode of the year so far.

[KevC1980]

It was a great episode Toups..but i have to say there were a lot of inside jokes with Carrie Fischer that i didn't get..As i don't know much about her besides her role in Star Wars..

[KevC1980]

Toups i have a feeling you will love tonight's Greenzo episode..It was hilarious..The party scene flashbacks were with out a doubt the best part...and we got David Schwimmer, Al Gore, Merideth Vierra, and a Harlem Globe Trotter..

[Toups]

Yeah, I loved it. LOL

Funny moments:

- the after party meeting with the party flasbhacks (Jack's hair, "Tool" written on Jonathan's forehead, Cerie punching Jack, Tracy stealing a sink, Liz making Dot.com and Grizz cry, Liz puking)

- Al Gore leaving to save a whale

- Jack thinking T.I. stood for Texas Instruments. LMAO

- Liz: "OK, this Earth is ruined! We gotta get a new one!"

- David Schwimmer as "Greenzo" haha

- Greezo: "Don't even tell me you're not composting your feces."

- Liz as Harry Potter and Kenneth as Austin Powers.

- Cerie: "Did he talked to me like I was ugly?"

- Tracy: "People are like Lemmings. Harvey Lemmings, my agent."

- Liz being all nervous when meeting Al Gore: "I'm Lemon"

- Liz and the pop tart

- Jack watches Canadian pornography? LOL

- Jack: "Look how Greenzo's testing. They love him in every demographic: colored people, broads, fairies, commies...gosh, we've got to update these forms."

[Toups]

Funny moments from "Someone to Love"

- Tracy: "I'm black, she's white. I'm black, she's light skinned black. I'm black, she's seventeen."

- Tracy to the pigeon: "What are you thinking eating old french fries? Have some self-respect. You can fly!"

- Liz after the Verizon plug: "Can we have our money now?"

- Bartender: "Here's your Nancy Drew." Jack: "For a man, it's called a Hardy Boy."

- Raheem and his friend training on the playground

- Raheem "America shocked my nuts."

- CeCe and Jack going off to "defile" the building with their secret affair and the camera panned over to the poster of Bill Clinton

- Liz threatning Pete about calling the feds on him

- Jack/CeCe's kiss and slap

- Tracy: "PANTS! PANTS! PANTS! PANTS! PANTS!"

- Jonathan: "You must love Mr. Donaghy as much as I do."

[KevC1980]

Toups i always look forward to your quotes..Do you check out the TV guide show blogs? they have great write ups of 30 Rock and pretty much every other show...My favorite part of the episode was the reveal that Raheem was making a tape to try out for The Amazing Race, instead of being the terrorist that Liz suspected him to be.

And it was great seeing the SNL alum on the show, since we won't be seeing new episode of SNL for quite sometime..

[Sylph]

“30 Rock” Rolls Ads Into Story Lines



In the Nov. 15 episode of NBC's "30 Rock," Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey, in their roles as Jack Donaghy and Liz Lemon, sang the praises of Verizon Wireless before Fey looked right into the camera and asked, "Can we have our money now?"

At least in this case, art did indeed imitate life. Verizon said it handed over an integration fee to NBC, in addition to some marketing support, for the mini-commercial within one of the network's hottest shows.

The scene in question featured Jack saying, "These Verizon Wireless phones are just so popular. I accidentally grabbed one belonging to an acquaintance." Liz responded, "Well, sure that Verizon Wireless service is just unbeatable. If I saw a phone like that on TV, I would be like, 'Where is my nearest retailer so I can get one?' " She then broke the fourth wall and addressed the camera with the plea for cash.

"We talk with NBC on a consistent basis about opportunities," said Lou Rossi, director of media and sponsorships at Verizon Wireless. "We had engaged them to think about some ways we could help increase our presence in the marketplace, and they came back to us with the '30 Rock'-specific opportunity."

Rossi declined to disclose how much Verizon paid for the "30 Rock" integration but said that in addition to fees, it provided marketing support for the show with a co-branded ad in Maxim magazine and promotional content on VerizonWireless.com. "We want an integration to be as organic and natural to a show as it can be," he said. "Certainly with the '30 Rock' humor and writing, this type of integration just works well for them and for Verizon Wireless as well." NBC declined comment on the financial terms of the deal.

It's not the first time the irreverent NBC comedy has made a joke of the increasingly common practice of product integration while at the same time plugging a network advertiser. In fall 2006, there was a similar spoof with Snapple in the episode "Jack-Tor," which featured Lemon and the show-within-a-show's other writers protesting a directive from GE and Donaghy to write product placement into the show all while talking about how much they love Snapple. The dialogue included lines like "I only date guys who drink Snapple" and ended with Donaghy saying, "Yes, everyone loves Snapple. Lord knows I do." There was even a guy in a Snapple suit who walked out of the elevator asking for the human resources department.

Snapple's integration was part of its media buy on the network, a company spokeswoman said.

Despite the integration deals, "30 Rock" has made it onto Nielsen's list of the top 10 shows with product placement only one time since the fall season started. "The Office," another NBC show known for cutting major integration deals with advertisers in the past but which insists it no longer is involved in any such deals, turned up on the Nielsen top 10 list for four of the first five weeks of the fall season.

Through Nov. 18, Nielsen tracked 142 placements this season for a total of 779 seconds, or nearly 13 minutes, for "30 Rock," compared with 381 occurrences for a total of 2,505 seconds, or nearly 42 minutes, for "Office." From Sept. 24-Nov. 11, there were more than 80 brand mentions on "Office," according to Nielsen. But sources at Reveille and NBC insisted the placements were all scripted and viewed as adding to the humor of the show rather than emerging from any media buys or integration deals with NBC Entertainment or Reveille.

"Office" showrunner Greg Daniels has said that the show is no longer doing product integration because he "found it pretty impossible to balance the desires of the ad agencies and their clients with the creative needs of the show."

Among the brands with the most frequent or longest-lasting placements in "Office" this season are Hewlett-Packard, Boise Paper, Cisco Systems, Ever apparel, Microsoft, Vizio televisions, Toyota, Ford and Office Depot.

Staples, which cut a major integration deal with "Office" last season, had only three placements this season, lasting a total of nine seconds, compared with 56 occurrences lasting 334 seconds, or 5 1/2 minutes, in the full 2006-2007 season through Sept. 23, including repeats.

All of last season, including repeats, "Office" tallied 1,463 placements -- 427 verbal and 1,086 visual -- for a total of 9,110 seconds, or slightly more than 2 1/2 hours.

From Hollywood Reporter

[KevC1980]

the cougar storyline was hilarious...And Tina Fey is best when Liz is in uncomfortable situations and trying to be cool...

My favorite lines were: "gellin' like Magellan" and ""I'm 37. Please don't make me go to Brooklyn."

[Toups]

Highlights from "Cougars":

- You can't be gay for one person. Unless you're a lady and you meet Ellen.

- Dot.com and Grizz on the baseball team with fake dominican birth certifigates

- the kids taking down the Jefferson Davis statue ala Saddam Hussein statue! LMAO

- Tracy: "They are from Knuckle Beach! A place where it is totally OK to substitute Orange Soda for breast milk!"

- Tracy: "Practices...meetings...what is this, a marriage?"

- Liz: "Shut it down...Shut it down."

- Jack: "Tracey, this is wonderful. I had no idea you were interested in baseball." Tracey replies: "I wasn't, my motorcycle hit a police horse this is community service."

- Liz: "I'm 37! Please don't make me go to Brooklyn."

- Tracey: "Everybody circle up...circle up. Around me. Alright, there's a weird dude standing over there and I don't want to get shot so...great hustle, great practice weird dude is gone so go home."

- Jamie: "Now I'm getting attitude from the sexy librarian over here." Liz replies: "Whaaat? Sexy? You are. Shut up."

- Baseball kid: "Someday, I'll have an office like this ... to clean."