If you follow Will Arnett on Twitter, then you've known the inevitable for days: Running Wilde's very existence is in mortal peril due to its lack of ratings. Arnett Tweeted reassuring stuff like:
@arnettwill Will Arnett To my UK friends, I dunno when #RunningWilde will be on there.If we don't get good ratings this week, it won't be shown anywhere.
@arnettwill Will Arnett Kinda bleak,need viewers,that's why I did all the lame self-promoting tweets.Tues ep I'm half nude and wash Richter's car.Tues,9:30 on FOX
@arnettwill Will Arnett Never done a grassroots effort, but let's save the effing show #RunningWilde Forever!(or 5 decent seasons,plus a 6th for 2&ahalfmen $$)
It dismays me that Will Arnett is not making the kind of money someone like Charlie Sheen makes. Peter Serafinowicz also stressed the dire straits his show is in:
@serafinowicz Watch @arnettwill and me in #RunningWilde tonight to stop us being cancelled! COME ON! Please RT!
So Running Wilde could be canceled, even as you read this. Just in time for them to debut an animated opening credit sequence.
After last night, I can't read anything @serafinowicz Tweets and not hear Alan Alda's voice in my head. Not only was the payoff for Fa'ad's "New York tough guy" character that Alan Alda as his acting coach taught him brilliant, but Serainowicz does an uncanny and hilarious Alan Alda impression. Fantastic visual gag of Fa'ad trying to get into the country club while the club employees gradually force him to wear a collared shirt and jacket, then turning tail and running when he got to Steve's table.
Keri Russell should be paid by her facial expressions and reaction shots. After morphing Emmy into the female version of Michael Bluth last week, Emmy shapeshifts into Lindsay Bluth this week. (Something Lindsay and Emmy have in common: they're both surfboards.) Emmy seduced Puddle's 12 year old boyfriend, thinking she was doing it to get him and Puddle back together. I mean, Lindsay only seduced Steve Holt, who was like 20, but the creepy factor ratcheted up to a million by watching mom-in-her-30's Felicity turn on a pre-tween. "If you're going to be direct, don't you think you should use someone's name?"
Andy Richter is thoroughly believable as a rich mustachioed secret queen who runs several private armies. I'd be less than a man if I didn't admit how much I enjoyed Will Arnett half naked washing the car and then rolling around on the grass with Richter while everyone watches from the mansion windows. (I think it's clear what I mean.)
"I don't have time for this!" "I don't have time for 'I don't have time for this'!"
"Oh Lunt, you rotting old puff, don't be silly! You're my mother figure!"
"Lunt, you gossipy old fish wife!" "Migo, you chatty Cathy!"
"Lunt, unlock my junior high school dance wear closet!"
"Huh. So this is what a father's kiss feels like. Yup, there's the tickle of that mustache."
I really hope there's a Running Wilde next week.
(edited by John Orquiola on 14.10.10 0645) @BackoftheHead
It's probably a matter of hours at this point, but this show can't go, for Fa'alan Alda alone. And just as Keri Russell grows ever closer to full-on Bateman capabilities.
This was an Arrested plot if there ever was one though, just needed a more scolding, bemused narrator.