No More “Starter Wife”?

I just couldn’t believe my eyes when I read this this morning!

USA Network has filed for divorce from The Starter Wife, citing irreconcilable ratings.

When the Debra Messing-fronted Wife debuted in 2007 as a six-hour miniseries, it attracted more than 5 million viewers and went on to earn 10 Emmy nominations. However, ratings for its 10-episode first season averaged just 2.4 million viewers — a decent number by most cable standards, but not for USA, where its top shows (Burn Notice, Monk) regularly pull in around 6 million.

In an exclusive statement, USA called Starter Wife a “critical and creative success,” and added that the Dec. 12 season finale served as a “satisfying conclusion” to the franchise.

Source.

So, here’s my question: if USA called it a “critical and creative success”, why cancel it? And I am definitely not satisfied with its conclusion in December. Speaking of that, did the showrunners know they were shooting the last episode in the series back then? Was that why it was wrapped up so nicely?

This Nice Girl doesn’t feel very nice right now.

Semi-Watching the Super Bowl

I DVR’d the Super Bowl so I could fast forward the game and just watch the commercials since my team wasn’t playing. (I know, as if the Chiefs even had a shot this year.) Except that when I did turn on the game about 15 minutes in, there was enough excitement that I had to rewind to the beginning and watch the whole thing. Darn those boys, they went and made the game itself interesting! Sure, I was also cleaning the house, folding laundry, cooking, periodically switching over to TNT to see which episode of The Closer was next in the marathon, and playing around online, but I really hadn’t planned to watch the Super Bowl in real time.

I wasn’t terribly impressed with many of the commercials, but did get a kick out of the multiple promos for Chuck and the one for USA that aired at the very end, during the post-game show. Here’s the USA promo if you missed it:

Hee! Shawn & Gus! Mike & Fiona! Even Molly from The Starter Wife, which I found encouraging since we’re still waiting to hear if that show is getting another season.

What were your favorites?

NGTV Guide: Friday, December 12

We have the season finale of The Starter Wife on USA tonight and one of the few remaining new episodes of Lipstick Jungle on NBC, so savor these shows while you can!

Lipstick Jungle – NBC 9/8c
“Chapter Eighteen: Indecent Exposure” – Tensions mount between Shane (Paul Blackthorne) and Wendy (Brooke Shields) When Josie (guest star Vanessa Marcil) offers him the chance to go on tour with Natasha Bedingfield. Victory (Lindsay Price) has to decide whether or not to shed her clothing for her brand’s new ad campaign and learns a bit more about herself and her affections for Joe Bennett (Andrew McCarthy). An emotionally vulnerable Nico (Kim Raver) is riding a hormonal rollercoaster from fertility treatments and forms an unlikely bond with Griffin (guest star James Lesure).

The Starter Wife – USA Network 10/9c
“Woman Over the Influence” – In the season finale, Molly assesses her future with Zach during Lou’s wedding. Elsewhere, Joan makes a confession, Rodney’s relationship changes, and Liz’s life becomes turbulent.

Also, check out The Starter Wife season finale photos in our gallery here.

NGTV Guide: Friday, December 5

TGIF! The Nice Girls are concluding a busy week by curling up with some of our favorites shows.

NOTE: Lipstick Jungle has moved up an hour so adjust your schedule accordingly!

Lipstick Jungle – NBC 9/8c (NEW TIME)
“Chapter Seventeen: Bye Bye Baby” – Nico (Kim Raver) and Kirby (Robert Buckley) adjust to life with baby Charlie and find themselves at a crossroads in their relationship. Victory (Lindsay Price) tries to land a new multi-million dollar client. Meanwhile, Wendy (Brooke Shields) is finding it increasingly difficult to get her latest project off the ground, especially when an arrogant movie producer tries to take her dream project from her.

The Starter Wife – USA 10/9c
When Joan reappears in Los Angeles, Molly wonders what happened to Pappy and why the police are investigating his disappearance. Catch the premiere of “Her Old Man & The Sea” only on USA Network.

NGTV Guide: Friday, November 28

Happy Black Friday! Did you score some major deals? Here’s the Nice Girls Deal of the Day: Psych is back! Our regular Friday night fare – Lipstick Jungle and The Starter Wife – are taking a break, which means our schedules are clear to enjoy Psych’s annual Christmas episode!

Psych – USA 10/9c
“Christmas Joy” – Gus’s family, including his sister Joy, comes to town for the holidays. Joy and Shawn have a hard time staying away from each other. The Santa from the local mall was arrested and put in jail. When a little girl comes into Psych and asks them to help get Santa out of jail, Joy convinces them they need to help. Shawn and Gus realize later that her story might not have been the complete truth.

NGTV Guide: Friday, November 21

Happy Friday, Nice Girls! Don’t forget that Lipstick Jungle is still on the air, and the ratings are ticking up slightly so there’s a chance NBC will have a change of heart and keep it around. Here’s what we’re watching tonight:

See more photos in the Gallery.

Lipstick Jungle – NBC 10/9c
“Chapter 16: Thanksgiving” – Wendy (Brooke Shields) rushes to plan and prepare a big locavore Thanksgiving dinner where all the ingredients used are local. Times get a bit more hectic when her judgmental mother Joyce (guest star Mary Tyler Moore), her newly single successor Sal (David Noro’a) and Shane’s (Paul Blackthorne) distraught manager Josie (guest star Vanessa Marcil) all arrive for the festivities. Nico (Kim Raver) plans the perfect Thanksgiving with Kirby (Robert Buckley) but a last minute request from Megan (guest star Shannon McGinnis) leaves baby Charlie in the inexperienced couple’s hands. Victory (Lindsay Price) is not looking forward to the holidays as she struggles to get over Joe (Andrew McCarthy), but things are on the upswing when an unexpected visitor asks her to design a wedding dress for his future bride in two days. As Victory feverishly works on her designs, dinner at Wendy’s becomes out of the question and her ex-publicist Dahlia (guest star Rosie Perez) makes a surprising return.

The Starter Wife – USA 10/9c
“Look Whose Stalking” – A confrontation with Molly’s stalker prompts Molly and Zach to examine their relationship. (photos)

NGTV Guide: Friday, November 14

TGIF, dear readers! Here’s what the Nice Girls will be relaxing with this evening:

Lipstick Jungle – NBC 9/8c
“Chapter Fifteen: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Prada” – Wendy (Brooke Shields) walks in on Nico (Kim Raver) and Griffin (guest star James Lesure) having an enjoyable lunch together, which leads to tension and a sense of betrayal between the friends. The two must put their problems aside when they find that Victory (Lindsay Price) is a mess after she learns that Joe (Andrew McCarthy) was ready to propose to her. Nico and Wendy feel guilty for not letting their friend know that Joe bought a ring and decide to take Victory on a weekend getaway to get her mind off of her disastrous love life. Unfortunately for the three ladies, the spa trip is not relaxing as planned and leans more on the side of catastrophic.

The Starter Wife – NBC 9/8c
“Look Who’s Stalking” – A confrontation with Molly’s stalker prompts Molly and Zach to examine their relationship.

Jane Leeves Stars on “The Starter Wife”

In tonight’s episode of The Starter Wife, entitled The French Disconnection, there will be a special treat, especially if you were fans of Frasier or Murphy Brown. For tonight we are introduced to Lou’s Alizee, the woman he is seriously involved with. When Lou brings Alizee to Molly’s little meet and greet, Molly is sure she knows her from somewhere. Well we certainly do. We knew her first as “Audrey” on Murphy Brown, and then on Frasier, as the delightful and quirky “Daphne Moon”.

Jane Leeves recently spoke about her character, Alizee. “I am currently scheduled to appear in a couple of episodes. And I’m playing Alizee; she’s a lady with a big secret. I like to describe her as sort of an Auntie Mame, Holly Golightly, larger than life, kind of the life of the party lady. But she is incredibly vulnerable, as these women usually are, very ballsy though. You know she sets her mind on something and she does it. And she is harboring a rather large secret.”

Jane’s been out of the public eye for quite a while. It couldn’t have been easy to jump back into a series. “It was intimidating, I was completely intimidated, because I have taken sort of a rather large chunk of time off to devote to my family and their psychic hold is slowly letting me go a little bit, you know they’re getting older now. And to sort of step back into something that sort of required not only my acting skills again, but to come up with some different and varied accents that I might be using during the series.

And to sort of step into something, I always felt sorry for people stepping onto the set of Frasier; these were people who had been together for 11 years, and when you work closely with those people, you sort of have a short hand. And an actor said that it was like working with the Flying Wallendas, because we could just go, “Yes, and I’ll do this and I’ll go here and dah, dah, dah.” And that’s sort of how you feel stepping onto a set where these people have established characters and you’re the new guy. But I couldn’t have been with greater people, Debra and Joe are just fantastic and I was very excited to do it, and very supportive, as well, they were.”

So what was it about this role that drew her back to television? “Well, the complexity of the character and to play somebody that I have never played before, you know I’m sort of usually the good girl, the sort of warm earthy girl and this was something that I hadn’t. I played Sally Bowles on Broadway and it struck me that was fairly similar to a Sally Bowles kind of a character. But I was really scared about doing it and I just remember when I was asked to do it, I just said “Yes, yes I’ll do it,” and put the phone down and thought, oh cracky what have I just done. But we like to challenge ourselves and this was so much fun.”

Jane stayed home for a while to raise her children. Being out of the loop, so to speak, we wanted to know how it felt to get back into things again, and how she saw herself in the future. “Well, you know it’s sort of interesting, when you’ve been on a show for so long and you sort of get used to that and then to find yourself sort of out in the marketplace again, the great thing about a TV schedule, especially a half hour, which doesn’t seem so popular anymore, everything is single schedule was that the schedule afforded me time with my family. And it would be fantastic to go back into something like that again, but that’s not the climate right now. But I’m sort of gradually working my way back in. I’d love to do more TV, movies would be great too. I’m actually going to be doing a little more theater. You know I’m not sort of drawn to any one medium, it’s just where I feel the good characters are, and television usually writes great characters for women.”

So, how did the producers approach Jane with the role of Alizee? Jane explains, “It was such a turnaround from Daphne and it sort of scared me a little bit and that’s why I said yes. I thought this is new and interesting and a complete departure from Daphne. So the producers actually approached me about changing my hair, as well. So they cut it dyed it and it was sort of like a new lease on life, really. And I came home and my kids didn’t recognize me. And they love it, she still smells like mommy, she doesn’t look like her, but she smells like her. So you know, it was a complete sort of 360º turn from Daphne and that’s what interested me most.”

Jane talks about working on the set of such a fun show. “Oh it was just great. I had met Joe Mantegna before and I had met Debra at various sorts of functions. And to have the opportunity to work with them was great and it was just sort of — I mean there is a lot of joking around and playing on the set and joined right in with that. But yes, they were very, very welcoming and sort of confessed to them before, “I’ve been out of the saddle for awhile, bear with me,” but it was just like putting on an old pair of shoes, you know a comfortable old pair of shoes and it was really, really fun.”

Getting back to Alizee, it’s not clear exactly how many episodes she will appear in; however, this is television. Anything can happen! “Well, I do appear in another episode, after the one on Friday. I’m not sure when that one airs, but there is a possibility that this will be an ongoing character. I’m not allowed to give anything away, I’m sure, about what happens, but it’s very interesting and crazy. But you know, hopefully yes, they only did ten episodes, but hopefully if they do more, then hopefully I can be a part of that.”

As we mentioned earlier, Alizee has a secret. Jane couldn’t really talk about it without giving anything away, but she did have this to say, “I think they’re figuring it out and I’m figuring it out as we go along. That’s the great thing about television; you’re sort of flying by the seat of your pants. You know, “Wouldn’t it be great if she? And what about?” And I think the whole surprise is equally — you know there’s sort of a — I think it’s kind of clever casting, to cast me, actually, to play this woman who has this particular secret. It’s so hard to talk about it, because I don’t want to give it away. But I thought there’s a little bit of tongue-in-cheek casting in this, I think, in regards to that, and I think thought that was kind of clever of them.”

You won’t believe who Jane’s inspiration for Alizee comes from. “I kept thinking of, when she was described to me, I kept thinking of Auntie Mame, and as I said previously, I played Sally Bowles on Broadway, this sort of very vulnerable person who was full of bravado, but underneath it there is this quivering lump of jelly and if you just dig deep enough, you’ll find her. You know they sort of create these personas for themselves to cover up some stuff that is going on underneath. And there may be more and more layers of that to be pealed away.”

Be it television or theater, Jane enjoys both. “I find them equally as satisfying, certainly doing the four camera sitcom thing is like doing theater anyway, it’s like doing a little play every week and it really is very gratifying to have that audience there and have an immediate reaction. So it is, in some ways I do find it more gratifying than doing single camera, because you get an immediate reaction and you know if what you’re doing is working or not. But they both have their challenges, and they’re both sort of equally satisfying, when you get to see the finished result.”

When Jane was asked about roles not yet played or genres not yet dabbled in, she says, “Well, I always think that I am like this character actress who has been handed these sort of leading lady roles. But I’m sort of always drawn to the crustier side of life, they sort of downtrodden women. But to get to play somebody flamboyant, which Alizee is; so I’m very lucky in that respect. And I’m going to be playing Mrs. Cratchit, so she is a complete departure from this, as well, in A Christmas Carol, over Christmas at the Kodak Theater. So that’s going to be something different to do, as well.”

We’re just glad to have you back on tv, Jane. We’ve missed you! Watch her tonight on The Starter Wife, on USA Network, at 10/9 Central.

NGTV Guide: Friday, November 7

It’s the end of the week and the perfect time for Nice Girls to unwind with some quality TV.

Lipstick Jungle – NBC 10/9c
“Chapter Fourteen: Let the Games Begin” – Nico (Kim Raver) nervously prepares to meet Kirby�s (Robert Buckley) mother Tina (guest star Rosanna Arquette), but her nerves quickly turn to shock when Tina turns out to be less like a mother and more like Nico. Victory (Lindsay Price) is done with Rodrigo and focuses all her energy on winning the chance to design a sportswear line for a professional tennis player. She needs Joe�s (Andrew McCarthy) help, but unbeknownst to her, he has been avoiding her at all costs after his failed marriage proposal. Meanwhile, Wendy (Brooke Shields) is upset and a bit jealous when Shane (Paul Blackthorne) signs with an attractive manager Josie Scotto (guest star Vanessa Marcil) who instantly books Shane on a movie, but the tables are turned when Wendy is recruited to produce the same movie. Also making cameos in the episode are sports figures Tiki Barber, James Blake, David Lee and Amani Toomer.

The Starter Wife -  USA 10/9c
“The Ex-Files” – Molly goes to surprising measures to protect her movie after Kenny threatens to derail it.

Interview with The Starter Wife’s Krista Allen

Krista Allen

NiceGirlsTV grabbed actress Krista Allen, recently, for a quick Q & A. Krista plays Eve on USA Network’s The Starter Wife, which airs on Friday nights at 10:00 p.m., 9:00 Central.

Krista appeared on the television shows Days of our Lives and Baywatch Hawaii. She has also appeared in Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Anger Management, and the Project Greenlight horror film Feast. Krista is also well known for playing a sexy virtual reality character Maitreya/Jade Blue Afterglow in an episode of The X-Files, and is remembered for her brief appearance as the busty “Elevator Girl” in the Jim Carrey comedy Liar Liar. She also played the lead role in the erotic series Emmanuelle in Space (1994). In 2002, she appeared in an episode of Friends,The One Where Joey Dates Rachel as Joey’s girlfriend Mable. In 2005, she appeared in the short-lived FOX sitcom Head Cases. In both Smallville and Mutant X, Allen played a woman who could control men with her sex pheromones. In 2001, Krista guest starred in supernatural TV series Charmed as “The Oracle” for three episodes, She also appeared in Toby Keith’s video “A Little Too Late”, and had a small role in CSI as a hooker, Kristy Hopkins who caught the eye of Nick Stokes in the pilot episode on October 6, 2000. She returned later in the first season as a murder victim. In 2005, she was one of the stars of HBO’s Unscripted, playing herself as an actress who struggles to overcome her sex symbol status in order to win more serious roles. Allen is featured in Maxim magazine’s Girls of Maxim gallery and was Named #70 on the Maxim “Hot 100 of 2005″ list. Allen had a recurring role on the ABC series What About Brian as Bridget, a reluctant but potential love interest for the main character Brian, played by Barry Watson. In 2007, Allen appeared in the ABC reality television series Fast Cars and Superstars: The Gillette Young Guns Celebrity Race, featuring a dozen celebrities in a stock car racing competition. In the first round, she matched up against skateboarder Tony Hawk and rodeo champion Ty Murray.

With a bio like that, it’s no wonder the show runners sought her out. She was thrilled about working with Debra Messing and loved The Starter Wife mini-series, so getting the part of “Eve” just seemed like kismet. Although the part is rather small, Eve can certainly set the flow of an episode, and Krista does a great job at being the beautiful nasty. “She’s that character, the mom from the PTA club that really nobody really wants to get too close to because they don’t really trust her, but for whatever reason she’s the queen bee. As far as Eve the character, it’s a fun one to play. There’s a vulnerable quality to Eve that you really don’t get to see, but I think she’s probably, at least the way that I was playing her, she’s pretty insecure about what she has going on in her life and she kind of uses all of her judgment and places it towards everybody else just to make herself feel better.”

Of all the characters Krista has played, Eve is her favorite. “I have had the opportunity to play so many different characters. I really love Eve and I really love her character even though she’s not the most likeable character because you just want to strangle her, but it’s kind of like you love to hate her. It’s such a fun thing to do. I’m a mother and I have an 11-year-old son. I’ve had so many PTA experiences through the years and so I get to draw from all of these different experiences and kind of make that into this character of Eve. I’d have to say Eve is one of my favorite characters that I’ve been able to play, plus I get to play off of Debra, which is amazing.”

Eve may be Krista’s favorite character to play, but Nice Girls wanted to know who else she’d like to play in the series, given the opportunity. “I haven’t even ever thought about that before. I don’t know. I mean I’m pretty happy with Eve, so I don’t know. Maybe I’d play Hart’s character. No. I don’t know. I’d just mix it up all together. No. I have no idea. I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about that, but I think all of the characters are so great. It’s one of those things when you asked me I thought everybody plays it so well. I think everybody plays their character so well that there’s nobody that I would think that I would want to go in and play.”

Krista is so good at playing Eve that we wanted to know if she, herself, knew anyone like her. “You know, I think all of us have known women like Eve. I think there’s an Eve in all of our lives, which is really fun. I have an 11-year-old son and I have been through years of PTA. The women that I’ve met through the years, there are certain qualities that you can pull off of those different people and so yes, I definitely know and have known people with those qualities and it’s fun. I mean the experience of PTA has definitely helped with the character of Eve.” I’m sure many of our visitors to NiceGirlsTV could agree.

We are hoping that Eve will come back in season two, should there be one, but we wanted to know what Krista would be doing if she wasn’t acting. “I love writing and I write a lot, so I really like that. I’d probably be writing something. I don’t know, or I’d just be a stay-at-home mom and be independently wealthy. That’s my choice; independently wealthy and taking care of my son. That would be my job.”

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