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By David Zurawik | July 16, 1991
LOS ANGELES -- As if blending fact and fiction doesn't make most docudramas controversial and confusing enough, wait until you hear the howl over what Ted Turner has in store for cable viewers this fall.Turner Network Television (TNT) announced yesterday that it will air "Iran: Days of Crisis," a docudrama about the the taking of American hostages in 1979 and the behind-the-scenes machinations to get them released, this fall -- at the very same time when real-life hearings on the same topic are expected in Washington.
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By David Zurawik and David Zurawik,Television critic | May 18, 1992
You could call "Calendar Girl, Cop, Killer? The Bambi Bembenek Story" a cheap piece of network sweeps trash.But it's not that good.The ABC made-for-TV movie is worth noting, though, because it suggests how advanced the brain and talent drain has become at the broadcast networks: They can't even make good sweeps sleaze any more.Most of the thinking on this film, which airs at 9 tonight on WJZ-Channel 13, appears to have gone into the advertising campaign. It features actress Lindsay Frost in fishnet stockings and a black bra with one of the shoulders straps worn off the shoulder.
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By David Zurawik and David Zurawik,Sun Television Critic | September 25, 1990
The docudrama "Good Night, Sweet Wife: A Murder in Boston" is bad "docu" but good drama.CBS' dramatized version of the murder of Carol Stuart -- who was shot dead while on her way home with her husband from a childbirth class last October -- is filled with questionable facts and intimate events the filmmakers could only speculate about.The film itself carries this disclaimer: "The following story is based upon actual events as reconstructed from news reports and interviews with participants.
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By David Zurawik and David Zurawik,Sun Television Critic | January 31, 1995
All of the television news images you've seen 1,000 times since O.J. Simpson was charged with murder, you will see once more at 9 tonight on WBFF (Channel 45) when Fox airs "The O.J. Simpson Story."The "Sugarland Express" escort for the white Ford Bronco, the blood-spattered walkway leading to the Brentwood condo, the baseball bat taken to the windshield of Nicole Brown Simpson's sports car -- they are all in this made-for-TV movie."The O.J. Simpson Story" makes "The Amy Fisher Story" look like a Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation.
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By David Zurawik and David Zurawik,Sun Television Critic | May 21, 1995
We almost did it. We almost managed to make it through a full television season without a rip-roaring debate about docudrama -- that much-maligned but highly popular formula built on the premise that the line between fact and fiction should be blurred.But now, in this last week of new programs for the 1994-1995 television year, come HBO's "Indictment: The McMartin Trial," ABC's "She Stood Alone: The Tailhook Scandal" and NBC's "Liz: The Elizabeth Taylor Story."Big names, big budgets, big controversy -- especially for "McMartin," which airs Tuesday, and will be repeated Saturday, May 31, June 5 and June 8. The executive producers are Oliver Stone, of "JFK" fame, and Abby Mann, whose career ranges from "Judgment at Nuremberg" to "The Atlanta Child Murders."
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By David Zurawik and David Zurawik,Sun Television Critic | February 28, 1995
Mia Farrow is in bed with Frank Sinatra. It is clear that they have just made love. She's looking satisfied, while there is something between a leer and a smile on his face, when Old Blue Eyes leans over her and says, "How did you like it -- my way."The needle goes straight through the red, and the kitsch-o-meter explodes. Forget Madonna, Roseanne, O. J. Simpson and all the rest. Fox offers a watershed moment in docudrama sleaze and kitsch with "Love and Betrayal: The Mia Farrow Story," which airs at 8 tonight and Thursday on WBFF (Channel 45)