Cocina Mexicana Crazy for Cop y Tequileria Shows BY BELINDA ACOSTA
Pi sburgh vs. Green Bay I should stop declaring that I don’t like police dramas. As soon as I do, another one GAME DAY Happy shows up and strikes my fancy: Blue Bloods, Detroit 1-8-7, Southland. I also watch Law FAJITA PAC GE & Order: Special Victims Unit. But now, Order yours for your party today Hour I’ve finally found a police drama that I do not 3:30-6:30pm simply like, but that I love. It’s The Chicago Sat, Sun & Mon 9am-1pm. Lamar Location Only Lamar Location Code, one of a slew of new series premiering 2038 S. Lamar 442-4441 after the Super Bowl. The series features a compelling cast of 5808 Burleson Rd 416-0749 characters led by Jennifer Beals (The L Word) as Teresa Colvin, the city’s first female superintendent. Her quick rise to the highest level in the police force is seen as a fluke, but her intense desire to see justice served is very real and deeply personal. She still remembers how her father died penniless after years of greasing palms to keep trouble from his ĵŊňʼnĽłʼnĹŎĵň hardware store. Now that she’s all grown up (and packing), Colvin has made it her life’s The Chicago Code work to expose corrupt city politicians. Bring down the top guns, and the street thugs will the character onscreen, offering some detail fall, too. the viewer would not otherwise know. It The bull’s-eye of Colvin’s target is shouldn’t work, and the description makes Alderman Ronin Gibbons (Delroy Lindo). it sound labored, but it’s very well-used and A master politician, he has built his per- concisely cinches a character’s backstory. In sonal wealth and professional reputation on fact, the convention is so cleverly used in years of well-groomed public performances, one portion of the pilot episode that when backroom deals, and other, less gen- it abruptly ends, it makes the turn of tile activities. While he manages to events that stops the delivery that keep his hands seemingly clean, much more shocking. Teresa knows he’s dirty and is The Chicago Code premieres determined to bring him to jus- tv Monday, Feb. 7, at 8pm on Fox. tice. When she seeks funding for a special task force to inves- eye What Else Is On? tigate city corruption, Alderman Feb. 8: When I Rise, 9pm W W W . M R N A T U R A L - A U S T I N . C O M Gibbons is the one who slaps her on PBS. The life and career of idea down. But that does not stop international opera star Barbara her from forming her own task force, off Smith Conrad is revealed in this new It is the dawning of spring. Birds are singing. Flowers are the books. The first person she taps for her film in the Independent Lens series. The East blooming. The leaves are budding out. And the village and unofficial justice league is her reluctant Texas native was among the first African- country folk from all around the nearby shires gather in ex-partner, Jarek Wysocki (Jason Clarke, American women to enter the newly inte- Sherwood Forest for a festive season. Musicians, bards, gypsies, Brotherhood). Brash, unconventional, and merchants, artisans, and chefs all gather under the protection of grated University of Texas in 1957. As if cocky, he nonetheless shares Teresa’s thirst that weren’t demanding enough, her life Robin of Loxley, known as the outlaw Robin Hood, to celebrate for justice. He eventually joins Teresa on spring, break bread, sing, dance and give thanks for another would take another dramatic turn when she her quest, bringing along his newest and rebirth of nature. While mixing medieval with renaissance, was cast as the romantic lead opposite a longest-surviving partner, Caleb Evers (Matt history with fantasy. We find joy in likeminded spirits. We want white male student in a university-produced our kids to see magic, gypsies, blacksmithing, jousting, glass Lauria, Friday Night Lights). opera, launching a heated controversy and blowing. We seek brotherhood and fellowship. We want to sing It all sounds like a conventional police prompting the Texas state Legislature to and dance together by the bonfire at Gatherings, break bread drama, but The Chicago Code differs in many react. When I Rise, which premiered at the with old and new friends every day, be good neighbors, and be ways. First, it’s a treat to see Chicago as more 2010 South by Southwest Film Festival, is stewards of the beautiful part of Texas in which our faire resides. than a few stock backdrop shots. Shot in and a production of the Dolph Briscoe Center http://sherwoodforestfaire.com/ off the beaten paths of Chicago, the show for American History at the University of has a verisimilitude you can’t fake (same Texas at Austin, executive produced by Don with CBS’ Blue Bloods, which is shot in New Carleton, and directed by Austin-based York). Viewers get a very real feel not only of filmmaker Mat Hames (Fighting Goliath). Chicago, but also of the Midwest. Narratively, Additional airtimes are Feb. 10 at 9pm and PROUD SPONSOR the series uses an interesting convention, Feb. 13 at 3pm. wherein a character will speak in voiceover, TICKET Follow TV Eye on Twitter: @ChronicleTVEye. GIVE to WIN TICKETS to THE SHERWOOD FOREST FAIRE, in first-person, either about themselves or E-mail Belinda Acosta at [email protected]. AWAY! log on to www.austinchronicle.com/contests
44 T H E A U S T I N C H R O N I C L E FEBRUARY 4, 2011 a u s t i n c h r o n i c l e . c o m