Roundup: Mom, Moderating with Oprah, 'Young Sheldon,' 'The Good Doctor' & More
May was a busy month so let's dive in and relive it all!
Before June kicks in, here’s a handy roundup of all my press coverage and Substack posts for the month of May. More good stuff to come!
Young Sheldon: May and TV series finale always go together so well as the month also marks the end of the broadcast TV season. I’ve been covering Young Sheldon since its premiere so I was glad to do several series finale posts for Variety where I talked to stars Iain Armitage and Annie Potts as well as getting some insightful post-mortem conversations (including Big Bang Theory’s Jim Parsons and Mayim Bialik’s return) with executive producer Steve Holland. As always, don’t click on these links until you’ve watched the episodes. Here are the links to Variety:
Young Sheldon series finale post-mortem
How Young Sheldon finally reached a heartbreaking moment (post-mortem)
The Good Doctor: After seven seasons, the Freddie Highmore-starring hospital drama closed its doors and I had the chance to talk to executive producers David Shore (also the show’s creator) and Liz Friedman about what we saw in the finale including the death of [SPOILER] and why they chose to bring back Claire over other past characters from the show’s history. Here’s the link to Variety:
The Good Doctor series finale post-mortem
Mother’s Day: This time of year is always one that brings back lots of memories of Patsy Jean Halterman, my mother, who died 31 years ago of a heart attack. I shared how I’ve dealt with that grief over the years as well as the original piece of writing I crafted for her funeral. I’ve heard from more of you on this story more than any other since I started this Substack page in January. Thanks for all the love. In case you missed it…
For Your Consideration: May is also the time of year when the TV voting season for the coveted Emmy award kicks into high gear so there will be a lot of campaign coverage as the best of the best are covered across the board. For Variety, I had the chance to talk to Maya Erskine, who I thought did such a great job as a spy in the Amazon series Mr. and Mrs. Smith. The show surprised me and so did Erskine! Check out our fun chat for Variety here:
Maya Erskine interview for Variety
Moderating Memories: I haven’t had the chance to do a lot of moderating since moving to Bangkok but this past week I moderated two zoom panels featuring the Lead Actor and Lead Actress nominees for the 51st Annual Daytime Emmy awards. Hopefully those videos will post soon but the experience made me realize how much I missed moderating so I shared one of my favorite stories when I moderated a panel and Oprah joined! Wait…what?
And since they were just posted, here are the Lead Actor and Lead Actress panels I moderated last week for the SAG AFTRA Foundation. The Daytime Emmys are June 7 at 8/7c on CBS.
Next…Phuket, Thailand!
Jim & Boyd Travel on YouTube: My husband, Boyd, and I have been taking advantage of living in Bangkok and recently took a quick two-day trip (we called it a ‘do nothing’ trip since our goal was to relax and unwind) to Phuket. Here’s the video of our trip for our new YouTube channel:
A Fish Called Wanda gave me my first Hollywood trip: Find out how Kevin Kline (a fellow Indiana University graduate) was responsible for me heading to Los Angeles for the first time in 1989. It’s a good story that he probably doesn’t even know about!
Last but not least, you don’t even have to click anywhere to watch a short video of me counting to ten since I’ve been taking Thai lessons.
More stories from Substack and from various outlets coming for the month of June so I’ll share those as they go live. Thanks for all the support!