
So it was a quiet Saturday night of channel surfing for LAist, and we stumbled across a 2001 film, Role of a Lifetime with Scott Bakula of Enterprise and Quantum Leap and Kathryn Morris of CBS' Cold Case. The premise of this "drama" in a nutshell: A washed-up LA actor, presumed dead, turns up just as his biopic is being filmed. He auditions under another identity and -- quelle surprise -- he gets the part. Unfortunately, said actor finds out on the first day on the set that his wife is directing the picture. No worries, however, because no one recognizes him -- even without wearing the Clark Kent specs.
What bothered us even more than the cheesy storyline, and the even cheesier lite jazz soundtrack that seemed lifted from a broadcast of 94.7 The Wave, were the commercial breaks. At one point during the latter half of the screening on NBC, we counted a break every eight minutes. And most of those featured the head-scratching pairing of Snoop Dogg and Lee Iacocca in the Chrystler ads.
Now we know why we usually go out on Saturday nights.




Sorry about the commercials, but at least you guys *got* the movie. Here in FL we had NASCAR, darn it! I do have the DVD and I really love the movie (although, I both a. admit to being biased and b. *don't* love a lot of Scott's movies), but it would have been cool to have seen it on TV (and bug all the rest of my friends to watch it). It was written/directed/produced/whatever by Tony Alda, btw (and I think they made it in 1999, but the posts on my site about it have no year stamp :-( so I can only guess)
Lee Iacocca and Snoop Dog? Luckily I haven't seen that one.. (I haven't even seen Donny Osmond's Sprint commercial more than once)