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Former Talk Soup' host
Henson stars in new show
Comic John Henson aims
to keep the Talk Soup’ feel
by having fun with the crew
of his new Spike TV show
By Steven Neuman
Freelance Reporter
When an on-screen personality of a
television show puts his or her name
in the title, disaster may ensue. A bad
review and your reputation could be
tarnished forever.
Given this, John Henson, host of
"The John Henson Project," has defi
antly put himself in the line of fire.
That's a hard place to stand consid
ering that most of the time Henson's
ing persona is extremely likable, and
more then anything, "The John Hen
son Project" feels promising.
Henson is best known from his
work on El's "Talk Soup" program. Af
ter Greg Kinnear left the show in
1995, Henson replaced the popular
host of an already established hit and
reinvented the show with his own
flair. Henson's "Talk Soup" roots are
prominently displayed in his new
"Project" — the writing staff boasts
many of the same writers, and the
"man talking to a camera" dynamic
still survives.
Henson said he was unafraid to
break new ground, making his own
comedy rather than stringing jokes
off the clip-based format of his pre
vious show.
'"Talk Soup' was very limited in
scope — it only dealt with the talk
shows," he said. "This show is skewer
ing all of pop culture from a male point
of view, so it's a much broader spec
trum to be dealing with creatively."
Henson first hooked up with Spike
TV when he taped a segment for the
short-lived "The Conspiracy Zone with
Kevin Nealon" back when it was still
known as TNN. Executives from the
TELEVISION
REVIEW
"Project" is
either bril
liantly funny
or horrifical
ly bad. Still,
his charm
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In “The John Henson Project," Henson graduates to a more experimental show.
network approached him last spring
with a proposal for his own show.
"The hardest thing in this business
that I've found is trying to find an out
let that wants you to do exactly what
it is that you want to do. Usually, they
want to do X and you want to do Y
and you find a compromise," Henson
said. "This is the first time since Talk
Soup' that I've really been able to do
whatever I wanted to do creatively,
and it's a lot of fun," he said."
In many ways, Henson's show is
like "The Daily Show" without the
politics. He looks through a male-cen
tric comedic lens upon the world of
news, sports and other topical hap
penings in a series of different studio
segments broken up by clips of sketch
style comedy bits. However, unlike
"The Daily Show," Henson doesn't try
to play the faux-newsman card.
Because "Project" is airing on the
testosterone-targeted Spike TV, the
show is obligated to employ Maxim
esque women in scantily clad outfits.
In terms of humor content, such in
studio segments seem to beg for a bul
let to put them out of their misery. A
30-second fashion show of models
wearing men's work uniforms was 29
seconds too long.
However, Henson has two strong
holds where his apparent stiffness
melts away to reveal sparkling come
dy: his weekly wrap-up of news, and
his outings into the real world. His ex
cursions to strange conferences and
events, such as a Los Angles auto
show or a local gun show, proves he is
funny when he lets his guard down.
In these bizarre locales are the
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moments of the dark comedy that Hen
son finally seems comfortable with.
However, the show is readjusting as
it goes and it seems to be on a good
learning curve, slowly fazing out this
shlocky shtick in favor of a smarter
style. The newest episodes seem to
have tightened up considerably, trim
ming the lame recycled "Man Show"
humor and stock jokes. Henson, like
many before him (Conan O'Brien
comes to mind), seems to be taking
time to warm-up to the gig.
"My hope is that as the show
moves forward and progresses that
each week, it gets a little funnier, a lit
tle more unique, and at its best you
think to yourself, 'If I like watching
that, then I have to watch this show
because these are the only guys do
ing that.'"
Henson said the one thing he tried
to preserve from his "Talk Soup" days
was the sense of fun the writers and
the crew were having on the set.
"That's our attitude: If it makes us
laugh, it should make the audience
laugh. I wanted it to feel like a
group of friends who were making a
TV show, instead of this cold, dis
tant, TV professional," he said.
"We're just a bunch of guys that
someone was dumb enough to give
a half hour of TV to, and this is what
we're going do to amuse ourselves
until someone comes to their senses
and fires us."
"The John Henson Project" airs
Sunday nights at 11 p.m. on Spike TV.
Steven Neuman is a freelance reporter
for the Emerald.
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