Another class with my name on it

Today I was joined by four of my J-school classmates in scoping out the “TV as Dramatic Medium” class in the film school. I think we were all sold within the first few minutes, when the professor said “This is a class for people who LOVE TV. If you don’t really like TV, or you’re skeptical about it, that’s fine, but you’re in the wrong class.” The idea is to study TV as an art form in terms of plot and character development, and how the shows are created and written, the same way film is studied seriously.

The syllabus she handed out includes a long list of 16 shows we’ll be discussing and TV as an art form, from The West Wing to Deadwood to Scrubs. Actually, a lot of these shows I haven’t seen, but now I’ve got an excuse: I’ve got to watch them for class! Between this class and the film criticism one discussed below, this is going to be quite the semester. Studying TV and movies for school…oh man, so psyched. (Kate, C, and my other fellow entertainment-obsessives: if you ever happen to be in New York on a Tuesday at 2 p.m. or a Wednesday at 10 a.m., maybe you could sit in!)

Too bad I didn’t bring my TV with me to New York, on the premise I’d be too busy to watch TV, but my I guess my Netflix account is going to get a workout. Right after class, one of my friends signed up for Netflix for the purposes of the class, and I got to watch her face as she discovered the marvels of the site for the first time: “They’ve got everything! This is like Christmas!” Sweet.