A shocking development on 'House.' Sigh.

Ted Forstmann working behind the scenes on William Morris-Endeavor merger

 

The ongoing merger drama between William Morris and Endeavor has an unexpected new player: investor Ted Forstmann.
 
A real-life “Master of the Universe” who found fame during the 1980s takeover battle over RJR Nabisco, Forstmann has been informally advising Endeavor partner Ari Emanuel on the deal that might create a newly combined Hollywood super-agency agency, one that would rival No. 1 CAA in revenue and the breadth of its client list.
 
“These are two guys who are old friends, and it’s entirely within the realm of reason that they would talk about something like this,” said Jim Gallagher, a spokesman for IMG, a sports, fashion and media marketing giant where Forstmann is chairman. Gallagher said Forstmann confirmed that he and Emanuel had discussed the deal often, along with other topics.
 
The connection is intriguing because of Forstmann’s past and the nature of IMG, which Forstmann’s private equity firm acquired for $750 million in 2004.

A veteran investor with a personal fortune estimated by Forbes at $1.5 billion, Forstmann shot to prominence during the Nabisco takeover war, when he was the cagey (and ultimately losing) rival to buyout king Henry Kravis. The battle was memorialized in the bestselling book “Barbarians at the Gate,” which led to the 1993 HBO movie.
 
IMG, meanwhile, plays a major role in both pro sports and high fashion, representing such celebrities as golfer Tiger Woods and super model Gisele Bundchen.

Forstmann’s informal role with Emanuel increases the tantalizing possibility that IMG could be involved in the newly combined William Morris-Endeavor entity in some way, potentially enhancing the new firm’s clout even further.

A spokesman for Endeavor wasn't immediately available for comment.

-- Scott Collins 

Photo: Ted Forstmann. Credit:  Mark Lennihan / Associated Press

A shocking development on 'House.' Sigh.

The following post discusses Monday's episode of "House."

Don't read on if you haven't seen it.

During the closing minutes of Monday's "House," I sat there thinking about how the show made me feel almost a year ago.

The death of Amber Volakis, Wilson's girlfriend, was profoundly moving. Anne Dudek had made a huge impression as the feisty, intelligent Amber, and her short-lived relationship with Wilson was greatly entertaining.

And then her death -- what can I say? That episode was one of the show's all-time high points.

Everything about the death of Kutner, on the other hand, smelled of manipulation. And how about that online "memorial" to Kutner that was advertised at the end of the show? Sigh. It just struck me as cheesy.

I have been dissatisfied with "House" all season, but the death of Lawrence Kutner might just be the coup de grace for this once-great show. Nothing about the patient of the week made much sense either. Everything about this episode was just … stuff. Stuff piled on top of stuff. It was just a grab bag, and a grim grab bag at that.

poll by twiigs.com

Kutner. Sigh. How exploitative and expedient to kill him off so randomly.

It's not as if the show ever developed him in any substantial way. Obviously this is Hugh Laurie's show and everyone else plays second (or third of fourth) fiddle, but some fans (and I include myself in this group) have long been unhappy with how the supporting characters have been handled.

I'm not going to trot out the expected complaints about Chase and Cameron. I'll just say that the one supporting character they chose to foreground this season, Thirteen/Remy, just isn't all that interesting. I'd actually given up hoping that they'd round out the other characters more, but with some recent Taub-centric activity, I thought they might be heading in that direction.

Wrong.

Kutner never really got all that much screen time or character development and though Kal Penn played him well, the character was never one-fifth as compelling as Amber. Heck, after two seasons, he still may not have been as compelling as the Season 4 character they called "Big Love." Kutner was just a guy, a pretty likable guy to be sure, but he was just a slightly nerdy, sometimes funny guy House worked with.

But, and this is typical of the manipulative "House" of this season, I suppose we were expected to have a some kind of emotional reaction to his death. Maybe you did, and if so, I respect that. Any depiction of suicide is sad. And I do believe that some people commit suicide without giving off any warning signs.

So the problem wasn't necessarily that Kutner didn't give any warning signs (all though I stand by my opinion that his particular death was a manipulative stunt). It's that the show didn't develop him enough for his death to have much of an impact.

The only way to give his death the "Oh my God!" factor was to make it come out of nowhere. But doesn't that fact -- that they had to make him die that particular way -- just prove that the writers failed with the character? They failed where they'd succeeded with Amber a year before? They had to go with shock value instead the kind of impact that is felt when the audience actually deeply cares about the character?

I just feel that Kutner was killed off because the powers that be wanted to do something. And killing Kutner was something to do. And it would give House a puzzle to solve. And repeating the fact that some suicides don't give off warning signs was just an easy out for the writers.

They wanted a shocker, and Kutner was chosen to deliver it. If I learned they'd picked who would die by throwing darts at a dartboard full of cast photos, I wouldn't be surprised.

From what I can gather by looking at my e-mail inbox, viewers are more flummoxed than anything. These are typical emails I received on Monday night: "Why was Kal Penn killed on 'House'??? He was one of the better actors on the show." "Why? He was great in that part." And so on. People just don't get it, and why should they? Their chains have been yanked by a show that used to explore interesting moral dilemmas, not traffic in "Grey's Anatomy"-style emotional ploys.

All in all, it's not as if I expected a simple "explanation" of his suicide, but the show wasting or at least under-using a character for two seasons then expecting me to react to his death is just presumptuous and tiresome. 

As for House himself, I think his browbeating of Kutner's parents was horrifying. He's done a lot of bad stuff on this show, but blaming Kutner's parents for their son's suicide was by far the worst thing he's ever done, in my opinion.

I have a tough time caring about the grief or pain of a person who is capable of something like that. So all the efforts to show me how much trouble House was having processing Kutner's death just didn't have a big impact on me. Sure, he felt some guilt and anger and also wanted to solve the puzzle. No surprise there. But honestly, he was such a cruel bully in that scene with the parents that it was hard to care about what he was thinking or doing. Even for House, that behavior crossed a line.

Don't get me started on the patient of the week. So, they were going to kill Eddie off on the operating table -- and Cameron was OK with that plan? And then they were going to kill him off on the operating table -- yet hide the fact that his condition was curable? And House was OK with that plan? Anybody was OK with any of these plans? Why on Earth would anyone ever have signed off on Eddie undergoing any surgery in his condition? None of it made much sense, not just morally or ethically but medically.

Everything about that patients' story felt slapped together, but then this is the Season of Random on "House." From one of the most smartly structured shows on television it has become a collection of things that happen, plus cutting one-liners and Huddy flirtation. And in case we're really stupid, it keeps hitting us over the head with parallels between the patients of the week and the doctors treating them.

Oy vey. I've given up on this show being cured of its maladies.

As they say, your mileage may vary. If you had differing (or concurring) thoughts about Monday's episode, leave them below.

UPDATE: I understand that Kal Penn asked to be let out of his contract to go work at the White House. That information doesn't change my reaction to the episode at all. In the post above, I am evaluating Monday's episode of "House" and Kutner's exit. I still think both were handled badly.

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Kumar Of Film Goes To The White House

Actor Kal Penn has been named to an Obama administration liaison post that connects the Executive Branch to people in the entertainment industry and Asian-Pacific groups. Penn is best known for his portrayal of Kumar in the stoner films Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle and Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay. He was most recently in the Fox TV drama House.