Private Practice

I’m always amazed at how busy the actors from Private Practice are even when the show is in production. Now that it’s on a “hiatus” of sorts due to the writer’s strike, the actors have remained just as busy.

Taye Diggs has been doing some good deeds of the victims of Katrina of late, but that doesn’t stop him from using his acting muscles as well. According to a rumor in Vanity Fair, Diggs might just be be starring in the upcoming Chicago 7 directed by Steven Spielberg along with Sacha Baron Cohen and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Well, Mr. Speilberg… HELLO.

Roma Torre from NY1 News is praising Audra McDonald’s work in 110 in the Shade, calling it “phenomenal.” McDonald IS a talented actress. Even if she is the wrong Naomi.

But I digress!

Here’s her belting out “Simple Little Things” on The View a few months back. I think she’s talented, no doubt, but her performance on was a little too over the top. Yeah, yeah, I know Broadway IS over the top… but her voice is just too… much like watching an obnoxious kid sing “Silver Bells” on Christmas. (Like a certain cousin of mine who used to think she was Barbara Friggin Streisand. You know who you are.)

KaDee Strickland and Paul Adelstein, meanwhile, are supporting the striking writers by their participation in “Diversity Day.” Check out Adelstein’s bearded up face – the typical “I’m out of work” sign for any actor.

Speaking of which… when’s that writer’s strike gonna come to an end already?

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Happy Birthday KaDee Strickland!

The Private Practice southern bell is 32 today.

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Funny how things work out. Just when you think life isn’t going your way, something SPECTACULAR comes along instead.

That’s got to be how KaDee Strickland feels right now. After all, her short-lived series The Wedding Bells got cancelled last year and she probably didn’t know what she was going to do next.

Then along comes Shonda Rhimes… and suddenly KaDee Strickland is the new doctor we love to hate on Private Private. Plus, she gets to do some steamy scenes with Paul Addelstein besides!

But that’s not the only hunk she can smootch with and get a paycheck for doing it. She also starred in the hit movie American Gangster and had a hot and steamy sex scene with Russell Crowe. Not bad.

Speaking of American Gangster, it just got nominated for both a Critic’s Choice award and a Golden Globe. Future projects will be flinging themselves upon her doorstep now (not that she wasn’t busy before.) Let’s just hope she doesn’t leave Private Practice in order to expand her acting chops.

Now, I know what you’re saying… I’m not a fan of her TWANG so I’m not a fan of the character. Not true. Nor, is it true that I hate southern accents all together. Just hers, for some reason. It think it’s the accident combined with the Julia Roberts tone that does me in.

I had to laugh, though, when Strickland gave an interview to the OttowaCitizen.com saying she can finally talk the way she really does! Apparently they downplayed the accent in the early days of the show. Her voice seems different even on this interview she did with E! back in September:

Sheesh! That must mean there’s more to come with that voice… let’s hope Cooper can stand it better than yours truly.

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I’m always amazed at how prolific the stars of Private Practice are in regards to other acting projects. We’ve got KaDee Strickland currently starring in American Gangster, Amy Brenneman starring in The Jane Austen Book Club, and Audra McDonald doing all kinds of stage work. McDonald’s current project, A Raisin in the Sun (the made-for-TV-movie based on the play), will be screened at the Sundance Film Festival in January. A Raisin in the Sun has an awesome cast. Besides McDonald, it stars Phylicia Rashad, Sean Patrick Thomas, and Sean Combs (that’s P. Diddy to you and me.) McDonald and Combs are the ones pictured, as if I needed to tell you that. Incidentally, Combs is in the part originally played by Sidney Poitier.

Astonishing, ain’t it?

Speaking of the Sundance Film Festival, this year’s “theme” (of sorts) is “films that explore individual ways of coping with a distressed world.” Bet you didn’t realize there WAS that many films that explore ways of coping with a distressed world, did you? Bet you didn’t realize the world was that distressed.

Well, I didn’t either. But another one of the films featured is Downloading Nancy starring none other than Private Practice girl Amy Brenneman. Brenneman plays Carol in the film (not Nancy, alas). Downloading Nancy is about an unhappy wife that meets a guy over the Internet and orders him to kill her, but then the two of them…. wait for it…. fall in love. (You knew I was going to say that, didn’t you?)

Downloading Nancy also stars Rufus Sewell (pictured – yum), Jason Patric, and Maria Bello.

(Sewell, Brenneman, Bello, and Patric are pictured here.)

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Went to see American Gangster last weekend, and I highly recommend it! I was surprised to see none other than Private Practice’s KaDee Strickland in the film. (Is it just me or don’t you just want to say KAH-dee upon seeing her name instead of KAY-dee? Why spell it that way? Why?)

KAY-dee has a very small part, but in my opinion, it’s one of the juiciest since she gets to have sex with Russell Crowe. AND she gets to scream out something I found pretty hilarious while she’s doing it. She plays his attorney, and apparently isn’t above getting friendly with her clients.

As far as the part itself, it wasn’t very much of a “stretch” since she played a woman in power who always looked and acted slightly pissed off. (Same as her character Charlotte King onPrivate Practice.) One (kind of annoying) thing I’ve noticed about her is that she sounds irritatingly like Julia Roberts. Close your eyes the next time you watch Private Practice, and see if you don’t conjure up the fictional Erin Brockovich from that voice? I’m not a huge fan of Roberts, so I don’t find this quality of Strickland’s very endearing.

The movie itself is one of those rare flicks that has you rooting for the bad guy, and just when you start to like the bad guy it reminds you of why the bad guy is bad… and then has you rooting for the good guy. Most surprising is that it’s based on a true story. It holds your attention from start to finish and Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington both are intense and fantastic. While they don’t have a lot of scenes together, there is one gem when they finally meet that is just outstanding. I won’t spoil it for you, but you’ve got to go see it this weekend. Promise?

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Several of the stars from Private Practice marched the picket lines this week in support of the writer’s strike. Amy Brenneman, Paul Adelstein, KaDee Strickland, Kate Walsh, Tim Daly, and Chris Lowell were all seen on the lines.

What do you think about the strike?

The sentiment I’ve heard has generally been positive, as most people informed about what the writers are striking for wholeheartedly support their case. Unlike many Hollywood endeavors that can seem “odd there” and demanding, this issue isn’t one of them. I support the writers, and while I’m bummed that some of our favorite shows may be affected, I understand that striking is a necessary measure.

I did, however, come across a hilariously crabby view on the strike, written as an “Ed-Op” piece by Brett Nolan for The Triangle. His view appears very “young” to me, especially given he mentions The Onion. For example:

Social Security is on the brink of collapse, the dollar is plummeting toward new lows, and Iran is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons - but at least celebrity writers are showing the nasty entertainment industry who’s boss.

I don’t even think The Onion could have made up a story as asinine as this.

Asinine? What Master Nolan is all snarked up about, I have no idea. Perhaps he’s bummed Chuck might go off the air and he’ll have to study instead. Maybe he doesn’t know that the majority of those writers aren’t the high-paid big wigs (ala our very own Shonda Rhimes, who reportedly takes down roughly $5 million a year) but rather the unknown and lowly paid schmucks that toil away and don’t get the cut the big old bad producers get. That’s incidentally why the bigwig writers ARE striking right along with the unknowns… to bring attention to this cause. And isn’t THAT what a strike represents? The power of many unknowns brought together to battle those in charge?